Looks like a different approach is being taken for Blackarachnia: Spoiler Optimus Primal trains with Dinobot, and tries to make him loosen up. Megatron has managed to decrypt a Golden Disk, but it is too damaged for him to receive the full mission. All of the remaining Predacons, except Skold, who is teased for being unable to fly, go out for an Energon run. The Maximals are playing a card game. Cheetor hears noise, and goes to investigate. Turns out… …It’s Blackarachnia, who manages to beat Cheetor, and a crocodile earlier. Highlights: It will be be interesting to see how Blackarachnia’s story arc will turn out. Can’t wait!
Some thoughts: Spoiler Cover A, whilst piece a nice piece, doesn't relate to anything even remotely featured in this issue. If Protoforms can have a Shell Program installed via remote upload, then this series should be over in the next issue. The Predacons will win the Beast Wars because all the Protoforms will be turned into Predacons. It does away with the desperate race to be the first to recover a Stasis Pod when it lands/crashes, which was an interesting aspect to Season 1. Vague message on the Golden Disk is vague. The Preds really have nothing better to do than stand outside Megatron's chamber? They just crash-landed on an unknown planet. Scorponok sure is chatty. Floating mountains have normal raw Energon crystals? Boo. Oh look. The Predacons are talking about nothing but Skold. Just like Cheetor talks about nothing but Nyx. A Pod lands and sensors on either side don't pick it up? Blackarachnia's Pod didn't scan. So she was already a spider? Why get in the water? Why get in the water?! "What's the composition on the atmosphere?" -- A writer, a Letterer, an Assistant Editor, an Editor and a Supervising Editor, and they all missed it? The Maximals really have nothing better to do than sit around playing cards? They just crash-landed on an unknown planet. Yes, but you should be the one screwing up around here, Cheetor. It's all part of your character arc and wanting to prove yourself. But alas. You've been robbed of that. Why are you talking to yourself, Cheetor? Because the writer is 7 Issues in and hasn't given you your due, thus you need to get up to speed quickly with two bubbles of 'character', and he has no other way of doing it other than the ol' lazy but reliable "the character talks to themself" routine. So, is the computer lying on purpose? Cheetor sure must have walked a long way for his crew mates, including the amazing Nyx with her sensitive audio receptors, not to hear all the fighting. *Exasperated sigh* 7 Issues. 140 pages of this crap. And counting. And what has happened in that time? Nyx flew somewhere and Dinobot got stabbed. That's it.
Harsh but true. This comic just feels milquetoast and poorly thought out. Nothing about the story or characters feels dynamic, everything just goes through the motions. The subtlety and engaging mechanics of the show aren’t there, replaced by characters being able to do almost anything at any given moment and things happening because the writer says so. And it’s still telling more than it’s showing. Think I’m done. I gave this book more than a fair shake and it just consistently fails to deliver. I’m sorry.
I enjoyed the issue. Might be because things are finally shifting focus, but whatever, welcome change then. Dialog continues to be clunky. I liked seeing the Maximals around the poker table. I feel like it would have been a great point to slip in some more characterization there, but at least we got a tiny bit of Rattrap. Skold looks really cool in with the new line artist. I liked the dragon gator thing that got ahold of Black Arachnia. As for the golden disk message. Eh. It's cool that they're taking it in a different direction, but I can't really be bothered to care about it at this point.
Spoiler Megatron is just as confused as the rest of us. That's quite a divergence from the original Beast Wars - and like, I wouldn't have wanted them to retread the original plot anyway - but I didn't expect to see a past/future version of this Megs sending a message through the Golden Disk. Apparently to himself, as a warning. What happened there? Or rather, what happens? Guess I'm just sticking around for that mystery alone. It was an interesting concept with Blackarachnia, showing Tarantulas attempting to remotely hack the stasis pods. Maybe the difficulty in sending the transmission and failing to immediately get a Predacon will convince him that it will be easier to simply wait for the pods to come down - or otherwise make them come done so that he can manually alter the code? Honestly, I think it might have been more interesting if Blackarachnia emerged neither Predacon nor Maximal and became an independent agent. She comes out knowing she's supposed to be an explorer, but not that she's a Maximal, then Tarantulas' programming takes effect and she becomes full Predacon, but what if she rejected the programming instead? That would be more fun, in my opinion. EDIT: Now that I think of it, though, are we sure it's Tarantulas? Context implies it is, especially given his plans as overheard by Rattrap in the previous issue, but we also know that the Tripredacus Council has a role to play...And we don't know if this Tarantulas is their agent or not. That said it's probably Tarantulas, otherwise his plan last issue wouldn't make any sense.
In a battle with such a small numbers of combatants, an advantage of one or two could dramatically turn the tide. There was genuine desperation to recapture a fallen pod, not only to bolster your ranks, but for the Maximals, to ensure that one of their own wasn't turned into an enemy. An episode like Fallen Comrades showed this desperation. An episode like The Spark used the opportunity to world-build, all the while with it's own ticking clock. Even Spider's Game showed that things can still go wrong in a Pod that lands normally. It isn't an exact science when taking on a Beast-Mode. But here, the Pod and it's Protoform are rewritten remotely, doing away with any sense of stakes. They've forgotten (or are oblivious to) what makes Beast Wars Beast Wars. In Season 1... I certainly hope this nonchalant approach to a fundamental element of Beast Wars isn't carried forward with Razorbeast's arrival. This isn't G1 where characters just turn up. Make it a desperate race, as it should always be.
Does everyone know Scold is strong yet? Strong enough to be in charge even? Characters keep bringing it up lol
It also once again contributes to the main problem of Energon radiation just not existing in this book despite the lip service its been given. The Energon was a constant hurdle both armies kept figuring out new ways to circumvent. They had to use line-of-sight laser transmissions because they could at best get a few miles of communications range to units in the field. It also meant they could never just contact the pods whenever they felt like it. (Dinobot had to bounce a laser link off the fake moon, which just happened to line up with Tigatron's pod that one time. If it wasn't there they would've never pulled it off) This book just doesn't have much of believable a world. It says a lot but does very little.
after a second read, im liking the delving we're doing on the predacons. many more shades of starscream are being painted on terrorsaur as he clearly tries to destabilize the preds command structure; undermining megatron, questioning scorponok's orders, who is a rival to him by rank, and purposely keeping down skold, who rivals him physically. its clear skold has inherited skorponok's twitchy nervousness and tendency to be looked down on as scorponok has been promoted to an apparently more competent second in command; dinobot labels him as a truly loyal pred and i imagine him likely having a possible military background similar to dinobot(his strategy and reasoning were quite competent and sound and he has a much better ability to command respect). i imagine this was done so the preds at least had someone decent calling plays when megs isnt around. i also love the sprinkle of possibility of waspinator just playing the doofus(that would be cool to see that go somewhere, but if not, who cares, its waspy, he's still fun). there is def something poetic and a nugget of intrigue about rhinox discussing his hopes of avoiding violence and conflict while effortlessly, and "supposedly" unknowingly, playing a winning hand at cards. i dont think he's traitor or anything like others theorize but there are hints at something going on with him.
Ohhhh God. I just had a sinking feeling. Spoiler What if Beast Megatron isn't supposed to be the Megatron on the disk and the artist made a mistake because they probably weren't super familiar with the brand
While I was hoping our first Pod would trigger the same type of race, I get the impression Blackarachnia's pod was knocked out of orbit by whatever Tarantulas was attempting in the previous issue before being interrupted by Rattrap. Hence the incomplete download that was resumed later. It was hopefully just relayed poorly and will be better fleshed out as more pods are introduced. If it's unique to her, it'll also set the stage for her eventual return to the Maximals as whatever shell program was installed was corrupted due to interference. It'll be interesting to see how this affects other pods, if it does at all. In the original, pods appeared to fall to earth based on what the plot needed to happen. It would make more sense if whatever Tarantulas was unable to complete triggered their descent. Whether all at once, or just threw off their flight plan enough that their orbit will decay in different increments. Razorbeast alledgely shows up next month, with Skold stumbling upon him. So we could see this get fleshed out more once we're able to compare the two arrivals. My guess would be the interruption will be enough reason for this to not work a second time. Going forward, the Predacons will likely need to get to the pod to reprogram it. This could all be revealed/explained when Razorbeast comes online and isn't overwritten in the same way Blackarachnia was. If all of the pods have started descending at once, it changes the nature of the war from the original. Instead of each pod being an individual event with the factions racing to get their first, you have a scenario where there are potentially multiple pods and the two factions have to decide how to prioritize limited resources. This lends itself to tension on both sides as different characters would have different ideas of how to go about it. Perhaps they know who's in the pods and Dinobot wants to prioritize based on Maximals who's skillset gives them a tactical edge even if it means spreading resources to thin or "sacrificing" closer pods to the Predacons. Meanwhile Megatron has similar thoughts, but is focusing on muscle because Tarantulas has proven able to override Maximal programming and create a loyal soldier (which leads to Inferno and his "YES MY QUEEN!" mentality). All leading to the other main conflict you could have: How do the Maximals respond to seeing their former comrades working for the Predacons? I can already picture a wedge being driven between the Maximals when they discover Blackarachnia. There's going to be some that want to fight but I'm sure Primal will be hesitant to hurt/kill what is effectively a brainwashed Maximal. Season 1 had Megatron and Tarantulas as the only real brains of the operation. Blackarachnia showed up and was pretty much right on board with Tarantulas working behind Megatron's back. So it's nice that while Terrorsaur is off cosplaying Starscream (as he did in the original) they've smartened up Scorponok and made him not only competent, but loyal. It gives Megatron someone to watch his back that he really didn't have throughout much of the original show. I don't think he'll turn heel. But giving us a glimpse in to his personality like this is nice since after S1 he was mostly just "the guy in the chair" back at the base while everybody else was off doing cool stuff. He got some "gentle giant" moments (especially to contrast his Predacon self in Dark Designs) so that's kinda his defining trait. Smart guy with a big gun, but didn't fight much once the Transmetals showed up. It's kinda like Marvel's What If...you see classic characters put in completely different situations and see how they behave. So even if this Rhinox is never going to turn heel, we're seeing shades of his personality that suggest the kind of person he'd be if working for the other side.
