...as the title implies I won't publish anything, Warlog or Otherwise until April 2009.
call it schedule hell......
-Johan
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Comic Review...
Transformers: All Hail Megatron #8
Writer: Shane McCarthy
Artist: Guido Guidi
(covers by Guido Guidi and Trevor Hutchison)
Summary: Flashback--Ratchet asks Sunstreaker how he is after being separated from Hunter. The other is unresponsive, lost in his own world. Now--Kup asks Ironhide what he was thinking, attacking Mirage like that. He tells him Mirage is not the traitor and tries to get through to him...They're interrupted as the Swarm has attacked their base and the others are outside fending them off. On Earth, Reflector destroys some humans while Starscream watches in disgust/fascination. He goes to the Insecticons and tells Bombshell he's sorry for Thundercracker's earlier behavior. He tells him they should talk (which means, a zany scheme to defeat Megatron is under way). Elsewhere, Perceptor and the others fight off the Swarm on the run. Perceptor shoots some explosives they'd rigged to slow the Swarm down. The Autobots reach a solitary bridge that when cut off will significantly slow down their pursuers. Perceptor is injured before he can destroy the bridge, leaving the others in a quandry. On Earth, Starscream tells someone off-panel that the time is now... On Cybertron, we learn Sunstreaker is willing to sacrifice himself to save the others. He tells Ironhide he is the traitor--he was willing to help Starscream take down Megatron, since Megs is such a monster. And he hates Earth and it's people (probably due to the Headmaster process). Just then, the Swarm shows up and attacks. Drift arrives and helps Ironhide get away while Sunstreaker sets off the explosives, destroying himself, the bridge and some of the Swarm. Later, Drift tells Ironhide that Sunstreaker couldn't have been the only spy--he simply couldn't have known all of the codes and such necessary. On Earth, Bombshell looks up at a machine. It contains Hunter O'Nion plugged into it!
Comments: Okay, I was wrong about Drift (which is good--that was too obvious anyway). Sunstreaker makes sense, all things considered. Even though he's technically dead, there were a million clones of him and Hunter is still alive, so... is he really dead? I wonder what Drift meant--was he referring to the element that Hunter represents or is there still another spy/somebody we haven't seen yet? I suspect the latter but we'll see... I also wonder if this was really all planned from the beginning or if they've been changing the story on the run. I'd initially heard this wasn't intended to be a mainstream continuity story but obviously it is. Was the initial idea different or was the story written and then altered later on to link up better with Furman's stuff? Not that it really matters, but... The art continues to be decent/good (this issue was all Guidi, thankfully. I hate it when more then one artist works on something, like with last issue).
Generally, I liked this issue and the story is improving immensely now that something is actually happening. Looking forward to next issue...
Recommended.
Thursday, March 05, 2009
Comic Review...
Transformers: Maximum Dinobots #1
Writer: Simon Furman
Artist: Nick Roche
(covers by Nick Roche and Marcelo Matere)
Summary: The story catches us up on what has come before. Grimlock is stranded alone on Earth, his fellow Dinobots missing and his ship is damaged and unusable for the time being. He attempts to contact help--which will come, for a price. Meanwhile, Skywatch deploys the remaining "thunder lizard" units, believing the control problems they had with Grimlock and the Recordacons to be fixed now--little do they know Scorponok's minions have tricked them into playing right into their hands. Elsewhere, Sunstreaker and Hunter O'Nion have tracked down one Machination facility but come up empty. Sunstreaker is distraught that his real head is out there somewhere and under Scorponok's control. Hunter reassures him they'll find it and put things back to normal. Sunstreaker is repulsed by the idea of being a Headmaster while Hunter seems to be somewhat fascinated. Hot Rod tracks Scorponok to his base somehow but Scorponok knows he's there and is ready for him... Grimlock is attacked on a glacier (where his ship is) by a legion of multicolored Headmaster Sunstreakers. They attack his ship and he uses the distraction to take them on! Shortly after, one of them attaches a module to him and he is teleported away to Fallon, Nevada, where the other Dinobots are deployed to apprehend him.
Comments: One thing I can't fault Furman for here--stuff happens in this story, right off the bat. Compare this with the parallel series of All Hail Megatron, where the first five or so issues ran at a snail's pace (yeah, yeah. It works better in TPB format--so what? It should work as individual parts too). Thanks to AHM, we already know Sunstreaker is back to normal in the future which works against this story slightly. Roche's art is mostly pretty good--I don't care for his neo-Dinobot designs though. They just seem wrong to me. Once again, I'd just prefer the classic G1 designs and don't see why IDW must reinterpret everything (then ignore it in AHM anyway). The story is a good serial story so far. Furman is a classic style comic writer, doing an issue at a time of an overall arc, not this new-fangled crap of stretching out a threadbare story over multiple issues. I mean, it's not high art but it's entertaining and at least I didn't read this story and feel like I would've wasted my money buying it (I have a copy on the way too, so technically I did buy it).
Recommended.
***
(As previously stated, I've not seen this series in comic shops where I live, due to Diamond's screw-ups in sending adequate stock out. I do not have issue #2 but did luck out and find a sole issue of #3 at a comic store--finally).
Transformers: Maximum Dinobots #3
Writer: Simon Furman
Artist: Nick Roche
(covers by Nick Roche and Marcelo Matere)
Summary: Skywatch dispatches Shockwave to find the other units (the Dinobots and Recordacons respectively), intent on keeping him on a tight leash. He warns that he will still have more then enough time to cause lots of damage in the twenty four hours they've given him. The director of the operation and his subordinate look at each other worriedly. In Fallon, the Machination's clone Sunstreakers come to attack the Dinobots. The other Dinobots are tough and feel like Grimlock's abandoned them.... Swoop even starts to fly off. The Headmasters strike Grimlock then and eventually start wearing him down, prompting the other Dinobots to turn and aid him after all. Elsewhere, Scorponok watches along with the beaten Hot Rod... he tells him he wants to see all he's accomplished before he has Hot Rod put to death. Elsewhere again, Shockwave detects Soundwave's lifesigns and goes to investigate... the Dinobots are being hit with everything the Machination has at it's disposal. Just then, the Monsterbots show up and aid them. It turns out Grimlock called them for help--and they will help, in exchange for some price (which is not spelled out in the story). Elsewhere, Scorponok has tired of Hot Rod's insolence and orders him to be taken and executed. Once free of Scorponok, Hot Rod uses the last of his energy to take out his two Sunstreaker-clone sentries. He collapses and then Sunstreaker and Hunter arrive.
Comments: I've not read issue #2 so this is a bit jarring but it's not hard to figure out what happened in-between issues. The Dinobots fought, check. Hot Rod fought Scorponok and lost, check. This is very much a middle issue of the story with fights and plans and counter-plans... a typical Furman story, to be honest (which can be good or bad, depending on one's perspective). The art is consistently good (save for my complaints about how the Dinobots look). I do hope M.D. wraps itself up as much as possible and leads into the AHM-era without too much trouble (I know, I know. There's another series coming at some point to bridge the gap--but I meant wrap things up as much as reasonably possible, considering the overall continuity and such). I also forgot to mention that I like the multi-colored Sunstreaker clones--it helps distinguish them, of course, and may or may not be a Diaclone homage at the same time.
(I'm going a bit easy on this series because it was hard to find around here and I welcome another TF story fix in contrast to AHM, which I don't much care for).
Recommended.
Writer: Simon Furman
Artist: Nick Roche
(covers by Nick Roche and Marcelo Matere)
Summary: The story catches us up on what has come before. Grimlock is stranded alone on Earth, his fellow Dinobots missing and his ship is damaged and unusable for the time being. He attempts to contact help--which will come, for a price. Meanwhile, Skywatch deploys the remaining "thunder lizard" units, believing the control problems they had with Grimlock and the Recordacons to be fixed now--little do they know Scorponok's minions have tricked them into playing right into their hands. Elsewhere, Sunstreaker and Hunter O'Nion have tracked down one Machination facility but come up empty. Sunstreaker is distraught that his real head is out there somewhere and under Scorponok's control. Hunter reassures him they'll find it and put things back to normal. Sunstreaker is repulsed by the idea of being a Headmaster while Hunter seems to be somewhat fascinated. Hot Rod tracks Scorponok to his base somehow but Scorponok knows he's there and is ready for him... Grimlock is attacked on a glacier (where his ship is) by a legion of multicolored Headmaster Sunstreakers. They attack his ship and he uses the distraction to take them on! Shortly after, one of them attaches a module to him and he is teleported away to Fallon, Nevada, where the other Dinobots are deployed to apprehend him.
Comments: One thing I can't fault Furman for here--stuff happens in this story, right off the bat. Compare this with the parallel series of All Hail Megatron, where the first five or so issues ran at a snail's pace (yeah, yeah. It works better in TPB format--so what? It should work as individual parts too). Thanks to AHM, we already know Sunstreaker is back to normal in the future which works against this story slightly. Roche's art is mostly pretty good--I don't care for his neo-Dinobot designs though. They just seem wrong to me. Once again, I'd just prefer the classic G1 designs and don't see why IDW must reinterpret everything (then ignore it in AHM anyway). The story is a good serial story so far. Furman is a classic style comic writer, doing an issue at a time of an overall arc, not this new-fangled crap of stretching out a threadbare story over multiple issues. I mean, it's not high art but it's entertaining and at least I didn't read this story and feel like I would've wasted my money buying it (I have a copy on the way too, so technically I did buy it).
Recommended.
***
(As previously stated, I've not seen this series in comic shops where I live, due to Diamond's screw-ups in sending adequate stock out. I do not have issue #2 but did luck out and find a sole issue of #3 at a comic store--finally).
Transformers: Maximum Dinobots #3
Writer: Simon Furman
Artist: Nick Roche
(covers by Nick Roche and Marcelo Matere)
Summary: Skywatch dispatches Shockwave to find the other units (the Dinobots and Recordacons respectively), intent on keeping him on a tight leash. He warns that he will still have more then enough time to cause lots of damage in the twenty four hours they've given him. The director of the operation and his subordinate look at each other worriedly. In Fallon, the Machination's clone Sunstreakers come to attack the Dinobots. The other Dinobots are tough and feel like Grimlock's abandoned them.... Swoop even starts to fly off. The Headmasters strike Grimlock then and eventually start wearing him down, prompting the other Dinobots to turn and aid him after all. Elsewhere, Scorponok watches along with the beaten Hot Rod... he tells him he wants to see all he's accomplished before he has Hot Rod put to death. Elsewhere again, Shockwave detects Soundwave's lifesigns and goes to investigate... the Dinobots are being hit with everything the Machination has at it's disposal. Just then, the Monsterbots show up and aid them. It turns out Grimlock called them for help--and they will help, in exchange for some price (which is not spelled out in the story). Elsewhere, Scorponok has tired of Hot Rod's insolence and orders him to be taken and executed. Once free of Scorponok, Hot Rod uses the last of his energy to take out his two Sunstreaker-clone sentries. He collapses and then Sunstreaker and Hunter arrive.
Comments: I've not read issue #2 so this is a bit jarring but it's not hard to figure out what happened in-between issues. The Dinobots fought, check. Hot Rod fought Scorponok and lost, check. This is very much a middle issue of the story with fights and plans and counter-plans... a typical Furman story, to be honest (which can be good or bad, depending on one's perspective). The art is consistently good (save for my complaints about how the Dinobots look). I do hope M.D. wraps itself up as much as possible and leads into the AHM-era without too much trouble (I know, I know. There's another series coming at some point to bridge the gap--but I meant wrap things up as much as reasonably possible, considering the overall continuity and such). I also forgot to mention that I like the multi-colored Sunstreaker clones--it helps distinguish them, of course, and may or may not be a Diaclone homage at the same time.
(I'm going a bit easy on this series because it was hard to find around here and I welcome another TF story fix in contrast to AHM, which I don't much care for).
Recommended.
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