It will be interesting to see what you say once you've read #8... Will anyone stick up for #8?Quote:
Originally Posted by STL
Printable View
It will be interesting to see what you say once you've read #8... Will anyone stick up for #8?Quote:
Originally Posted by STL
I did. Sort of.
I actually quite like Verity and Hunter, they're some of the better human characters in comic and cartoon continuities in my opinion. But all humans from AHM onwards I could care less for.
In fact, the Ongoing has done a damn good job of making every TF unlikeable too. Magnus is now a dick, Hot Rod is a dick, Prime is pathetic, the only character who is actually likeable is probably Bumblebee, but it's not like he had a great storyline or anything, he's just not acting like a jerk.
The Ironhide mini seems OK, though I haven't read #3 yet.
Quoted for truth.Quote:
Originally Posted by Oilspill
And arguably most of the same could be said for all the otherpussiescharacters; Bumblebee included. I have never read a more forced ascension to leadership than that.
I liked Ongoing's Swindle!
And Cliffjumper to a lesser extent
Read #8. Not as bad but not great. I personally found very little likeable in the issue. I think the concept is fine and I'm not as angry as others are about Spike taking out a TF with so much as a bit of liquid and blasters. This seems to be where all the fanboys are up to their panties in it. A TF getting taken out by a miserable little human? While on initially reading this thread and elsewhere online I was grossly sceptical, in the context of the story I find it believable. Spike has planned this. He knows what it is, he knows it needs to be taken down and so if he is going solo, you would expect him to be prepared and have done his research. Hence, the liquid/blaster etc.
My problem however is motivation and organic growth with the plot to get it to that point. There's a mixture of motivations underpinning his attack on the combiner. Is it revenge? Is it to protect the Autobot alliance? Is it to stop the devastation that a combiner might cause? Is it to let his hair down? Is it to prove humans are tough enough to deal with the TFs themselves? All of this is messed together in a mixing bowl of the fight without any clarity whatsoever. It is set against the backdrop of a military conversation that was tense. How does this fight fit into the context of that with it's mixed messages? Honestly, there's no character work and nuance to make it work.
Human stories can be good with TFs. However, this is a superficial attempt. It's lame and is ill-directed. It is passable as a whole b/c if you really wanted to, you could construe all the motivations together such that it means Spike did some significant on multiple fronts. That said, why solo? He trusts his men seems to be the message at the start. Again your problem however you may argue to him this is very personal. BUT again, where have you developed the character to the point where any of his actions matter or can be positively construed? Nowhere. This could've worked but what it requried was more careful character work rather than a mere few pages all in the one spot where the reader has to just accept this coming out of nowhere. Did you really expect fanboys to react otherwise? While IDW/the writer may rationalise it but there's one simple fact : Execution is piss poor.
And I say this ignoring the fact that I would much prefer reading something like the Ironhide mini where it's human free. I like reading about robots. Any story can work but you have to give it the right notes and treat it like a piece of art and work on construction. This fails on all accounts.
Add to that, there's a jarring disconnect between the cover art (style wise, very G1) and interior art. Very weird. Next issue has an awesome Combaticon cover but crikey I hope interiors reflect this. Despite how harsh I've been, this issue was actually to me more tolerable than a few of the first 6 issues.
That said, despite the balance that i've provided here I'm not hanging onto the book. Well, unless 9 blows me out my socks but I'm pretty committed to the trade path now. I have three versions of various trades plus single issues. I support them more than I should for their mediocrity and it comes to an end now.
It's not so much the tools that bother me, as much as it is the Constructicon's (is it Scavenger or Bonecrusher, I'm not even sure) complete lack of fighting back. It's a completely one sided fight which annoys me as the Decepticon is a war veteran of millions of years, and Spike is a douchebag of 20 something years. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by STL
That, and like you said, the execution is piss poor.
Ugh. Re-read that and that was a messy bit.Quote:
Originally Posted by STL
My point is:
Why solo? This contradicts the early part of hte issue where he talks about his bond with his men and their loyalty. If he trusts them, why not select a group to go with him rather than going solo?
STL, you seem to have misinterpreted why that Spike sequenced pissed us off. It's not so much about Spike taking the Decepticon out all by himself but how he did it and the intentions of the writer for having him do it.
It was basically a pointless sequence to show off how 'bad ass' Spike is otherwise he would have kept his shirt on while doing it.
Also in the future, please don't be so patronizing to your fellow fans. ;)
Really? Like this?Quote:
Originally Posted by kup
Quote:
Originally Posted by kup
Quote:
Originally Posted by kup
Quote:
Originally Posted by kup
Quote:
Originally Posted by SilverDragon
Quote:
Originally Posted by Oilspill
On the basis of that comment there alone (ignoring the previous couple of quotes before that) I'd say my post is more trying to dissect in a critical and reasoned manner the story than throwing around cheap little one liners.Quote:
Originally Posted by kup
A Constructicon was chosen for a reason (re-read the issue). And the method Spike used to disable/kill, is plausible.Quote:
Originally Posted by kup
I am not going around calling anybody a "fanboy" in a degrading manner for expressing their opinion. That's what triggered what I previously said not the rest of your post.Quote:
Originally Posted by STL
I disagree with the execution. Although I am not a fan of the concept of a human so effortlessly killing a Transformer, I could have lived with it if it was believably done. The way it was executed was horrible. It's not about plausibility but a really forced attempt to make Spike into a Super cool bad ass. Killing the Constructicon was just a tool for accomplishing that which to me sucks as well as the whole issue just building up to show us how 'awesome' Spike is.Quote:
Originally Posted by griffin
I don't need to re-read the issue to see that.
Haven't read the issue so I can't say how good/bad it is and won't read it till it gets released as a TPB. Guess it must have been done not so well since none of us are kicking up a fuss about the likes of Circuit Breaker and the Mechanic p0wning TFs during the Marvel run.
Circuit Breaker was a kind of a Marvel style super heroine so she was believable within the universe presented. The Mechanic was indeed stupid and I think several of us have expressed that over the years :)Quote:
Originally Posted by heroic_decepticon
Minor thing: he did keep his shirt on. The shirt in question was just extremely tight. The scene was also very darkly lit, so it wasn't obvious.Quote:
Originally Posted by kup
Sometimes people only see what they want to see.Quote:
Originally Posted by SilverDragon
Yeah they do indeed. I remember a fair few posts of that on another topic actually.Quote:
Originally Posted by STL
super tight shirt or no shirt really doesn't change things that much. The intent is the same on the part of the writer.
"This friend of mine went to get you a tighter shirt..."Quote:
Originally Posted by kup
"There is no tighter shirt! We checked!"
Finally, something funny from TF2 worth quoting for a laugh... :p
Erm... people have b!tched about the Mechanic... he's indeed a rather forgettable G1 human villain. As for Circuit Breaker, as kup said she's a super-powered villain (later a dubious "heroine" when she joined the Neo Knights) -- plus she's HAWT. ;DQuote:
Originally Posted by heroic_decepticon
Anybody read ongoing issue 10 yet?
I'm getting tired of how the art style keeps changing. YEP, the art style changed AGAIN. This is the fourth such change since Don stopped drawing this book.
i read it.... didnt notice it too much but then that could be after effect of blocking bad art out..Quote:
Originally Posted by FFN
spoilery below
what i didnt like was onslaught... he appears to be a bumbling idiot... instead of a military stategist...
and for some reason they rely on swindle for plans and everything.......
and not to mention the autobots staying in car mode...
Issue 11 came out this week, and sets up a bizzare situation for what we know of Decepticons... and it bugs me.
These are warriors who take what they want, not work for it.
We have the Combaticons 'working' for Energon, supplied by Nth Korea, and now we have the Predacons appearing to be defending China's territory, like mercenaries.
I remember seeing some Decepticons barely surviving on some baren planet in an earlier issue, but these ones on Earth shouldn't be content with working for humans. They should be taking and destroying.
Is this what happens to the Decepticons when there is no real Leadership/Dictatorship controlling the troops? Or maybe this is their way of infiltrating Human super-powers without setting off a nuclear war or military strike.
I'm hoping it leads up to something worthwhile in the 12th issue, as it should be the final issue in the second story arc of the Ongoing comic.
If this is what im missing out by not reading the comics... then whatever.
Well IDW's Decepticons have never really seemed to be the just "taking and destroying" type. Their phases approach to war was to use the local resources to get their energon rather than taking by force (and it makes them stand out from other Universe incarnations of the Decepticons). Getting paid by the Asian governments for shelter and their military might seems to be working out quite well for the Combaticons and Predacons really. They've not been executed like poor old Thrust.Quote:
Originally Posted by griffin
The only thing that really bugged me in this issue was the scene with Brawn at the beginning -- because the strong grumpy Minibot is actually Gears not Brawn and if anyone's got to have issues with being left out wouldn't it be the paranoid Red Alert?
I also think one of the panels of Vortex being taken out by the Autobot's backup seemed confused. It's like a panel is missing of the actual collision/attack? One minute he's jumping the next he's falling down to the ground?
Just read issue #10, and it was a setup issue for #11, no question about it.
Though it was a stupid autobot plan... "lets get mauled, and have soldiers get truly hurt, just to instill a false sense of security on the decepticons... for when we bring in a secret weapon next time."
Art is improving, and surprise, surprise, the more transformers, and less humans the better the issue. (still hated the rather bad portrayal of a certain human leader, very Team America).
Issue 12 provides a bit of an odd conclusion to this story. On re-reading the speech at the end might be a good bookend to some of the earlier scenes but as a standalone issue I was thinking "boy this book is getting preachy".
There's some stuff I can't comment on without spoilers so spoilers the ending is supposed to be shocking but I find myself not caring. IDW have played the shock death card far too often for me to be concerned the way I should. end spoilers
Best bit of the issue: Cosmos gets his moment to shine.
the more i read this the more disapointed i get where did the predacons get the energon from to leave the others.
and as i said somewhere else. an oh so too familiar scene to wrap up the book
a year into the book and it feels we have nothing....
So boring, so dull, and some of the better scenes with TC are not seen?
And the conclusion is just a retread of a retread of a retread. I wonder if IDW will put out another Mini to revive the character "killed off" where Alpha Trion awakens him somewhere? :rolleyes:
Well that was stupid. The only good bit was Rampage - it's intriguing that he and the Predacons have made their home in China and it's a fantastic contrast to the typical Transformers All Live In America trope. The problem is, the series does not have a good enough writer to take that great concept and actually run somewhere worthwhile with it. And I hope that guy at the end was IDW's Joey Slick, because if that gun was anything but Megatron, this series makes no sense at all.
Okay... this has bugged me since the previous issue as well but... since when did North Korea border the Republic of China?!??! Last time I checked, North Korea shared a border with The People's Republic of China, _not_ the Republic of China. In the last issue the Predacons told Optimus Prime that he was coming too close to the border of the Republic of China - then in this issue again they speak of the Chinese Republic (and not the Chinese People's Republic).
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y22...lmmegatron.jpg
Quote:
Originally Posted by GoktimusPrime
isnt that like jsut refering to the united states of america just as america.....abbreviated....
No. You could refer to the People's Republic of China as just "China" and the Republic of China can be simply referred to as "Taiwan," but they're not the same 'country' - whether you consider the Republic of China to be a separate state from the People's Republic of China is open to debate. The People's Republic of China is officially recognised as a sovereign state by the United Nations, whereas the Republic of China is not. That's why in Australia we have Chinese embassies and Chinese consulates, but we don't have Taiwanese embassies or consulates. But we do have equivalent organisations (e.g. Taiwanese Friendship Associations) which perform similar duties as embassies and consulates (e.g. renewing Taiwanese passports, Visas etc.).
If you look at the Wikipedia page for "Republic of China" one of the first things it states is "Not to be confused with the People's Republic of China." The Republic of China has a separate government (semi-presidential republic) and currency (Taiwan Dollar) from the People's Republic of China (which is a communist state and their currency is the Renminbi (or Chinese Yuan)). They also have a separate flag and national anthem (although not officially recognised). The Republic of China also uses a different written language from the People's Republic of China (Taiwan uses traditional Chinese whereas PRC uses simplified Chinese).
I'm not trying to start a political debate about Taiwanese sovereignty - but the fact is that the People's Republic of China = mainland China, whereas the Republic of China = Taiwan. And it's a fact that North Korea shares a border with the People's Republic of China, not the Republic of China.
In terms of geographic location, the Republic of China is also an island which lies east to the People's Republic of China and is separated by the Sea of Taiwan. So to say that North Korea shares a border with the Republic of China is like saying that New Zealand shares a border to the north of NSW.
The Transformers Ongoing comic takes place on an alternate Earth to ours. One where the Decepticons spent a year bombing the #$@% out of the whole planet. Isn't it possible there were political changes after this world war against the Cybertronians?
Dislike the comic for inconsistencies with the Transformers themselves perhaps, rather than with politics of our world.
12 issuees in that is one full year of comics... so what do we have
in a nutshell
not a lot.
Prime gave up the command
Bumbles took over
magnus came and then left i assume
hot rod has gone into space
alot of characters we have seen only once or twice...
a little fighting
and a lotta humans
thundercracker getting some limelight
after 12 months and the end of issue 12 all i can say is
why are the autobots even bothering with being on eearth, the humnas are not weak they can single handedly take down a transformer so why not leave the planet and let them take care of the cons and go do something interesting and worthy of reading in space. need protecting my butt..
Transformers is missing something. what is it you may ask
the answer is simple
a writer that knows how to write transformer storiees
More happened in 4 issues of Drift or ironhide then it did in 12 issues of ongoing
in my opinion the first year of tf comics gets a C-
A plausible fansplanation (about as plausible as trying to explain the significant reinvention of Europe in "Trans-Europe Express").Quote:
Originally Posted by Paulbot
While such fan theories may be arguably plausible, one wonders if this was the author's intent or if he just screwed up. :p
I thought the entire point of using real world references was to 'ground' the story into reality and make it feel more real for readers. If not, then why else bother using real world references?Quote:
Originally Posted by Paulbot
Furthermore, it kinda affects my enjoyment of a story when it takes a real world reference but then portrays it in an unrealistic (or highly unlikely) scenario. I can suspend disbelief when it's something that's not grounded in reality (e.g. a race of sentient living transforming robots), but when you start making direct references to reality, then once you start defying it, it kinda feels strange. Another example would be say Spider-Man 2's suggestion that nuclear fission can be created from a single atom of tritium. Yeah, um... no.
You're better off just making up fictional stuff and going off that, like fictional elements (e.g. adamantium), fictional biology (e.g. midichlorians) or even fictional geography and poliltics (e.g. Prince Jumal, Abdul Fakkadi or the Socialist Democratic Federated Republic of Carbombya) etc. -- at least if it's fictional then noone can question it and it becomes far easier to suspend disbelief and lose yourself in the fantasy.
Isn't this simply an instance where someone made a mistake.
With name? Such as making a parsec a measure of time rather than distance?
(and no doubt it could be similarly retconned to make actual sense)
Yeah, but it's fairly significant stuff up. And they did it twice. When it happened in #11 I noticed it, but thought to myself that surely they'd correct it in the next issue. Nope.Quote:
Originally Posted by snazzbot 101
I would also put to you that it's a greater stuff up than using parsec to measure time rather than distance, because it could be argued that time and space are one and the same... whereas I don't know how one could argue that North Korea shares her northern landlocked border with the Republic of China when it's common knowledge that it's shared with the People's Republic of China.
True... but until such a retcon is cited in canon, then officially it looks like a stuff up. At best it's a fansplanation (a rather awkward one at that). If it's officially retconned then I'll happily accept it - but until then I think it's rather questionable. (-_-)Quote:
Originally Posted by snazzbot101
grounding a story and making it feel more real to readers is not why i read comics.....besides how real can giant alien robots be anyway... i do not need a geographic or political explanation to figure out the predacons were not happy campers...
True, but if you believe something is correct (such as that China is the Republic of China) you will continue with that mistake until someone corrects you.
If someone asked me on the street what China's official name was I would like to think I would answer correctly. Republic of China does not sound right somehow, but I can understand how someone simply made an error and it simply not made aware of it.
But I never knew Taiwan was known as the Republic of China.
But now I know...