Transformers #38

Even as its sister title wraps up one of its biggest stories ever, IDW’s Transformers continues to chug along as it builds steam towards “Combiner Wars”. The crossover event begins in just two short weeks, so it falls to this lone issue to wrap things up on Earth.

One interesting thing about this latest run on Transformers is the need for discretion. With memories of the All Hail Megatron-war still hot in the minds of Earth’s inhabitants, both Autobots and the EDC-allied Decepticons have had to keep a lower profile than usual, earning the series’ former subtitle and recalling something of Simon Furman’s infiltration-based take on the franchise.

As intriguing a twist as this has been, it’s opposite number throughout the season has been Prowl’s almost gleeful willingness to blow cover in spectacular ways. Both come very much into play.

As he potentially moves to fill Megatron’s vacant shoes at the end of a road paved with good intentions, Prowl’s state of mind has come increasingly questionable. John Barber does a good job of giving us glimpses into Prowlvestator’s fractured mind without spelling things out too much. It’s pretty fun to watch an assortment of the most savvy beings on Earth playing off of eachother and coming up short in the face of Devastator’s overwhelming power. In fact, I can’t tell if the handling of Devastator, or rather the pacing surrounding him, is a positive or a failing.

Admittedly, Devastator could be read as woefully inefficient, taking pages to complete simple actions, even accounting for the challenges Barber throws up in his way. Despite this, however, I really only noticed this because I was looking at the issue with a reviewer’s detachment, which points to Barber’s handling of the situation being strong enough to engage the reader. I can’t even call it a writing trick, because there is nothing to indicate that events aren’t occurring simultaneously or Devastator isn’t just actually taking that long to process what’s going on around him.

The other characters in South China are written well enough. As I mentioned, it’s great fun to see the various styles of the players clash against one another. Spike, Faireborn, and Arcee each have their own charm, but Galvatron and Blackrock prove the most fun on their respective scales. You can’t help but feel that Blackrock is due for a fall, but Barber holds him back just enough that he never feels too slick to get away for the moment. Likewise, Galvatron is in a rather smug mood this issue, which not only provides Barber with an easy way to emphasize dramatic moments, but some nice subtle comedy as he’s repeatedly reminded what it’s like to not be the most powerful bot in a confrontation.

While all of this is perfectly solid, Barber’s real strength is writing the risings and falls of individual characters and relationships and this proves true in this issue as well. After spending the season up to this point as a source of comic relief, occasionally flat out playing the role of dramatic Fool, Thundercracker finally takes center stage. Barber never pats himself on the back or overemphasizes the fact, but he manages to highlight the contrasts and similarities between Thundercracker and Soundwave, our two ‘sympathetic’ Decepticons. I’d honestly say that Barber’s greatest achievement is the sense of urgency in Thundercracker’s voice, at least when I’m not feeling snarky and replace it with Soundwave’s annoyance when he picks up assuming Thundercracker is looking for notes on his screenplay.

Andrew Griffith gets plenty of opportunities to show off his talent for rendering the Transformers characters, with a slew of large panels, often half a page or more, appearing throughout the book. Surprisingly, given the sheer scale of the action in Wanmu, many of these panels feature Thundercracker, however, given his place as the emotional core of the issue, I doubt many fans will begrudge the creative team for giving him a day in the sun, especially with Combiner Wars on the way. Much as it’s present in the writing, Griffith really supports and articulates the sense of exhaustion and fear that Thundercracker is dealing with.

While they continue to improve, Griffith’s humans are still hit or miss and one otherwise gorgeous panel of Soundwave depicts the Decepticon Major Domo as extremely top-heavy, but all in all it’s not only a notably even issue, but a very well told one. The bouncing between decompressed splash panels and highly efficient pages full of motion likely finds its earliest expression in Barber’s script, but, particularly in pages like Spike’s entrance, you can really feel the effects of Griffith’s choices about motion and continuity.

Josh Perez also does a fine job, bringing the vibrant colors of the Devastator fight to bear without breaking the comic’s semi-realistic tone and keeping things clear, even when a panel of a flying Thundercracker is basically composed of little more than subtle gradations of dark blue and grey. Devastator’s dialogue balloons look lovely, the bright colors recalling the Combiner’s classic color scheme while communicating the force of its words. And, of course, Soundwave’s sunset vacation is a highlight.

In fact, if there’s one way that I feel the comic objectively failed in its intentions, it’s in not drawing a little more attention to some rather important text in the corner of one late panel that I read completely differently my first few times around.