SPOILERS AHEAD

#1: Bumblebee

Mowry's writing was adequate. I enjoy these kinds of expanded universe stories which help flesh in existing movie-continuity; in this case further highlighting Bumblebee's reunion with Sam, how that effects Sam and his relationship/interactions with others (e.g.: parents, friends, rivals etc.), and it was cool seeing Barricade back in action... though I was disappointed to see Barricade driving out of that explosion - I was hoping they'd kinda leave an ambiguous fate for Barricade at the end, which would help to explain why we never saw him in "Revenge of the Fallen."

Mowry's humour is preferable to Michael Bay's. e.g.: Bumblebee running through red light cameras (thus effecting Sam's driving licence & record), the woman in the other car totally freaking out at Sam because she sees him "driving" with his hands behind his head (reminding Sam that he has to keep at least one hand on the steering wheel to maintain the illusion that he is driving Bumblebee!) etc. Funnier than Jetfire farting parachutes or Wheelie humping Mikaela's leg any day IMHO.

Carlos Magno's art... I'm not a huge fan of. His humans sometimes look too similar; at times I had trouble distinguishing between Sam and Ron Witwicky - but my main gripe was with the way he drew action scenes. His action poses aren't terribly dynamic and his sense of cinematic choreography fails to excite me. Often one panel doesn't seem to 'connect' to what's happening in the next panel with a sense of "visual logic." Magno's art is otherwise not bad and he seems to have the potential to be a decent comic book artist. Perhaps Magno would benefit from having a closer look at Geoff Senior's G1 and G2 art for a better idea of how to 'animate' action scenes in comic books.