He likely had it changed a while ago. Seems like a big mistake to make if so.

 

I really think I should remove the 'con symbol...


The sword:
https://www.shapeways.com/model/231410/drift-sword.html?materialId=6&li=ostatus

Sorry to spam pictures here but man I love this Cyclonus.

 

I keep hoping someone will make the MTMTE head of cyclonus to put on the generations toy.

 

...and 'bicep swivel'. That's one thing I wish the Classics Seekers had, Universe Cyclonus, and probably a bunch of others I'm forgetting.

I love the toy nods in the comic... the above Ratchet bit, "knock-offs", stuff like that.

 

I think at one point—prior to the reveal—it read "WASTE DISPOSAL" when it should've said "BOMB DISPOSAL." So if it's a mistake, it's been made before. I couldn't find anywhere else in the issue where I could read his arm, though. Actually, it seems like any writing at all is missing from his arm entirely most of this issue.

 

oh shit!

i just realised what that scene a few issues back was about, where tailgate asks skids and hoist if they can tell what he is making

 

Oh yeah! Good catch  

 

Process' Drift sword. One of my favorites. I got a couple for a custom I'm looking on last year. Hope to get it finished soon....

 

And you know how they fixed it

THEY PUT MORE LITTLE BOTS IN THE SHELL.

It must be roomy as heck in there.

 

I agree to some degree. But I also think that the criticism is still valid. Comic-book plotting is a craft of its own, and pacing is definitely one of those weak areas for Roberts. Obviously, this wouldn't have been a problem if there was no externally mandated deadline for wrapping up this story arc, so I do sympathize with those conditions. I would have happily rode this out for another 6 months if that's what it took to get it right. That said, it's not the first time that Roberts has had to sprint a little at the finish line of one of his stories... in fact, whenever he has to script action over dialogue, these weaknesses come to the fore. It's clearly something needs to work on. We shouldn't be cutting him slack "because he's more accustomed to writing prose", but rather urging him to adjust his planning and pacing.

Maybe this time around, it was due t circumstances beyond his control. That sure does suck, but the end result is a relatively weak climax to what has been a pretty fantastic 2 years of build-up. All we have is the product. But whatever... you win some, you lose some.

This is a very good post, and well argued. I absolutely agree with your perspective on this, and echo your sentiments.

Exactly! Sometimes the needs of the story outweigh the needs of the character... and in that sense, they are one and the same. We have to remember that these characters are only expressions of the story. What is hurts the story also hurts the character. That was Tailgate and Cyclonus' moment. That was the end of their story. Any pleasure I might have gotten from Tailgate's survival was pretty much deadened by the dull thud it made when it hit that last page.

Sometimes a weak, contrived, awkward plot twist makes my fiction far less enjoyable than the timely, meaningful and resonant death of a character.

I think you're going a bit overboard here. It's not about CAPITAL LETTER IRONY AND GRIMMY GRITTY REALISTIC DARK DARKNESS. Sometimes it's about drama. Sometimes it's about consequences. Sometimes characters die. Geez.

As for reading or watching movies or television... um?  

You're kind of off the mark there. Death, consequence, moral ambiguity, sadness, loss... all of these things are pretty essential hallmarks of grown-up fiction. You're acting as if all media should obey Saturday morning rules. It's a bit much.

As for the 'Big Quest'... well, since (as you pointed out earlier) Tailgate has only known about his Cybercrosis for about 4 issues or so, I wouldn't exactly call The Cure For Cybercrosis the "big quest" of the series. I miss Rewind WAY more than I would have missed Tailgate. You don't see me kicking up such a fuss about it. I complained that the mechanics of the circumstances leading to his death were a bit clumsily handled, but his death was sad, it was unnecessary, it was abrupt... and it has provided for one of the most moving moments in any Transformers series ever. A good story is worth the sacrifice.

It occurred to me. Dammit. Sometimes villains just have to die too.

No, narrative contrivance controls that. Otherwise called "the power of -just because-".  

I kind of feel that way too... but at the same time, it feels like even a YEAR would have been more acceptable. I mean, they do live for millennia... a year is still a damn young 'bot, right? It just feels like 2 weeks was an arbitrary and ill-chosen period of time to run with.

I know what you mean here too, but because it's an big twist action beat with a little extra dose of WTF, I kind of accept that one. I mean, I would have been fine with Ambus staying dead too, but that was one surprise I was willing to accept because it did make me chuckle.

However, I was kind of sick of that gatling cannon being overused.

Yeah, sometimes Roberts throws things at us that seem dumb, and then get an explanation a couple of issues later. Sometimes that makes him seem brilliant... other times it just seems like he's covering his ass. Timing is important. If he had given us a reason RIGHT THEN why Ambus would have a double body, I think it would have been a bit easier to swallow.

If by 'out of the blue' you mean 'pulled out of his ass", I guess so.  

Again, timing. If he'd seeded us with more clues... the way the Great Swords work, the power of Cyclonus' Spark, some sensible explanation for why stabbing people through the heart actually makes them better... well, it might have sold me.

I KNOW, RIGHT??

  I had the exact same thought. Like, I actually went back and re-read it, to see if he mentioned ankles. Assuming that the neck/shoulders/hips StarWars figure holy trinity of articulation is taken as a given, I think I agree. Waist/knees/elbows are definitely the next important ones.

zmog

 

You know, since Tyrest tried to kill Ambus by crushing his head, that probably means he didn't know that there was a whole 'nother level to go. Minimus would've greatly trusted Tyrest, yet he still withheld how many shells he had. Who knows what else he's hiding?

Or maybe Tyrest just forgot that when he poked his brain.

 

Of the "fun little guy" population of the Lost Light...Pipes, Swerve, Rewind, and Tailgate...there was room to kill maybe 2.4 of them before the whole thing became an exercise in "don't fly out into space if you're a Minibot unless you have a Pretender shell or fully-integrated neuroware."

And hmm, two of them are dead and the other had a scare, what do you know?

I'm not sure why you wrote around my pointing out that the circumstances of Tailgate's illness were as contrivedly cruel as it gets but we are clearly just doomed to disagree.

Sometimes...you gotta kill Wash. Sometimes...you gotta spare Xander at the last second because it felt wrong to kill him with two episodes to go. Sometimes...you gotta kill Coulson, but hint that he's still alive so you can parley that into a major television show. There's no magic formula.

You feel cheated, fine. I would have felt cheated if a completely arbitrary circumstance had killed Tailgate just to wring a little more pathos out of Remain in Light. I can't quantify my hypothetical feeling of cheated-ness against your feeling of cheatedness, but there is no magic formula that would make it objectively better. Theres' just better for you and better for me.

I guess what I'm saying is that Tailgate's "stupid news" was SUCH a mean-spirited dropping-of-the-axe that he might as well have survived and made me smile at the end, because the news was already at peak stupid..."courageously" killing him is just as arbitrary as sparing him, so we might as well keep him around.

Plus, Cyclonus is now in a much more interesting place that we've ever seen him. For the first time since the Annual flashbacks, he has no obvious reason to be angry or depressed.

 

Well now that his middle shell is gone he's got space for rent. I bet you could fit two whole minicons in there.

 

I BET HE'S HIDING REWIND IN THERE

And Pipes too, for good measure. Though didn't they fetch his mid-shell somewhere in the comic or the prose story?

 

They do seem to be catching a lot of the abuse don't they? Pipes, Swerve, Tailgate, Rewind, Rung even... he likes to pick on the little guys. I guess because it elicits more sympathy from the fans (case in point).

You seem to be of the opinion that a TF developing a terminal disease is only acceptable if he then beats that disease... as if tragedy has no place in the literary endeavour. I don't think that's a fair stance to take. In Tailgate's case, he was sitting underground, unmaintained for 8 million years, and has been having gear-grinding issues since his first day on the Lost Light. I'm not sure how it's "contrived", and I'm also not sure how a terminal disease can be anything less than "cruel".

I dunno... going into this last plot arc, I was hoping Tailgate would pull through, but I was pretty much ready to accept that he might very well just kick it. I accepted that as a possibility. In the end, the way the story unfolded, I think his death is even a BETTER outcome, narratively speaking.

But... I'm not going to get bent out of shape for a fictional character. They aren't actual people. I don't feel bad for him or his family. His passing wouldn't be a 'real' loss. He is only a narrative appendage, a sock-puppet on one of this series' many tentacles. His only purpose is to evoke emotional responses in ME (and you, and other readers). I think the whiplash reprieve of this issue does itself a disservice by undermining the very emotional response it managed to evoke.

See that... that felt arbitrary. Joss Whedon and James Roberts share many tendencies. Whedon sometimes kills or abuses adorable characters for the cheap feels... Roberts, well there you go. But yeah, as you say, sometimes you just have to let Tailgate die, and let his tragedy be a tragedy.

It's comics. People come back. Sometimes we're GLAD to see them back. But it takes a deft touch to make it work, and the Coulson thing was just weeeeeak. I mean, sure they have a spin-off to sell, but that's no excuse for hand-waving it.

See, Pipes felt like that. It was a cheap death (but we didn't care so much because in the end, it was just Pipes). In Tailgate's case, it's actually one of the LEAST arbitrary bad things to happen to anyone on the crew. His illness was seeded from the beginning, and was a direct result of his "origin". It's not arbitrary, like a stray shot, or getting stomped on by a super-psycho, or getting attacked by a Sparkeater, or sucked out of a hull breach... it's an illness that he had to deal with, that brought him and others into an encounter with an inevitable mortality... only to find it... evitable?

Also, frankly, I'm a tiny bit bored with the little guy. I feel like his schtick has run its course. With the tension between him and Cyclonus drying up, and all of his secrets out in the open (more or less), I don't feel like he's bringing a lot to the game besides "awwwwwww". In fact, his survival simultaneously makes him AND Cyclonus both less interesting.

The only reason I'm kind of glad he pulled through is because it avoids the repetition of the "lanky big guy loses his special little guy" motif. There is that.

Yeah, but I feel like your level of emotional investment is... compromising? I guess I consider the natural needs of the story ahead of my sympathy for the character.

Unless of course it was Whirl. If he got melted, I would be crying blue murder.  

Yeah, I don't get the math in that equation at all, but what can ya do?

Again, remember what's good for the character is not necessarily good for the story! Happy Cyclonus? Nope. That cannot stand.

Well, Dark Cybertron is just around the corner. We're bound to lose a few characters there at least... and maybe they'll actually stay dead for a few issues (or a few pages, even) for a change.  

zmog

 

Yeh I wish.

Oh did they? That would support my theory that the reason he was wearing two shells was because he was too small for the Magnus armor and had to be adjusted to fit.

 

I have a question about Tailgate.

If he was only two weeks old before becoming trapped underground for 8 million years, Why did Ratchet say he was an antique? He mentions that he was all pulleys, levers and pendulums and yet there are dozens of bots who are older than him and they didn't have those kinds of bodies even back when the Ark 1 launched.

I mean, why would anyone have placed a new spark in such an old body?

 

Judging how everyone seems to change body bits over the years, and that the only thing that remains constant is the spark and the innermost energon, Tailgate never got the upgrades that 6 million years of life would have given him.

It could mean also that forged Cybertronians aren't particularly gifted with impressive bodies at first. Maybe Rivets Field was a particularly aincient patch of dirt to start with, and ignited with Commodore 64s rather than Quad Core Robots!

(Also, first post!)

 

I feel like Tailgate is needed for the story if for no other reason to be around for people to explain Cybertron history to, thereby relaying it back to reader.

 

An "walking exposition", you say?