IDW Transformers ongoing [spoilers]

[heroic_decepticon]

I recently picked up the first Henkei! Henkei! TPB, which was written for a younger audience - and I'm finding it a more satisfying read than what IDW's churning out atm! And at 490JPY (or $11 at Kinokuniya's inflated import prices) per book much better value.

hey dude, which section do I go looking for this and what's the full title?

[GoktimusPrime]

Should be in the Japanese book section - the new manga and magazines are near the rear entrance/window. Check Kinonavi to see if they have any in stock, cos when I went there a few weeks ago they had none in stock, so I had them specially order one for me from Japan (took less than a fortnight to get in - but they ask you to give them a month). Any books that aren't in stock but are in their Kinonavi database you can ask them to order for you. There's no extra charge.

[SamLoi888]

Just read the 'For All Mankind' TPB. It was pretty good I thought.

[heroic_decepticon]

Bought that at 20% discount from Kino and read it yesterday too.

I don't know, it felt like the six issues could be done in 2 or something (again). The highlight for me was seeing Menasor my fav combiner and to see how cunning Swindle is. That's pretty fun. Thought also that the Thundercracker solo story had a lot of potential, but then it went back to the 'main' (boring) story too soon.

The "Rodimus" part was used appropriately I thought, but Hot Rod is even more of an a$$hole (and a f**king idiot) than his G1 persona. That's fine, I hate him enough as it is already.

Once I started ignoring the faces, I'm quite ok with the art. It's highly experimental and I gotta take my hat off to Don, this guy has one heck of an imagination, this being the nth evolution of his art style.

[kup]

I just read issue 8 of Ongoing and I am disgusted by it. I have never read such a horrifyingly bad issue, not even the worse AHM issue or the 'I am transformed' issue of the first volume of ongoing compares.

The issue is all about showing us what a hard ass Spike is and how he can take a Decepticon single handedly with no weapons with a bare chest. As I was reading I was like WTF?? every second page that just focused on how cool Spike is. What dribble.

I am so glad that I am no longer paying to read this s**t and it's becoming even less acceptable to read even for free due to how horribly written it is and themes it follows.

I am saddened by this comic - What happened to Transformers comics?? How is this crap acceptable as a professional work is beyond me, it's just crap. It feels more as if they got some school kid with a hard on for Spike to write it.

Enough ranting but Drift is becoming much more palpable than Spike, specially after this issue.

Where does IDW pick up it's writers?

[heroic_decepticon]

that sounds horrible. I have no idea why there is such a focus on Spike even in the earlier issues of Ongoing. They certainly seem to be going for the "extreme" and "bad-ass" type characterisations lately.

My thought would be to make it another human character having this traits rather than Spike since his character has been well established by now and is quite different from how he is being portrayed.

[SharkyMcShark]

The last half of Issue 8 was alright. Up until he went into the meeting with the generals and the Joint Chiefs it was pointless posturing and mostly unneeded NEST, I mean Skywatch development.

The second half seemed more pertinent - I'm fairly sure they're setting General Allenby to be one of their main thorns in the side, although one hopes that they do this beyond making him essentially Galloway from Revenge of the Fallen.

The context of the fight (NO BACKUP OMG LOW TECH HARDCORE) was pretty poor, but I felt there were some nice touches. The flashback with Devastator where he looks like a monster (sharp teeth, skull face etc)was a very nice touch. I mean, the concept that the humans consider all Transformers as monsters is one that should be obvious if you've read the last like 12 odd issues + Spotlight: Prowl, but it's a nice visual representation of that especially if you put it next to the frame in AHM 2 where Devastator is destroying the tunnels - they're drawn almost exactly the same aside from the face.

I like the final line, about how he hates machines that make him feel like a machine.

The concept of disabling a gestalt by physically killing off one of the opponents was I felt an interesting line to take (given that they've generally gone for a suppress and capture approach before as opposed to outright killing).

So yeah, I thought it wasn't all bad. Definitely not a great, or not even end of the road, but there are some nice touches in there.

[griffin]

So I take it that IDW is taking on the idea that a TFs brain/spark is in its head?

For such a technologically advanced race, it would be expected that the most vulnerable component would be in the most centrally located part of their body (the torso/chest).

Shooting anyone in the head (like Megatron or Scrapper) shouldn't kill them, at the most, it should only disable them. And even still, you'd think that they would have secondary sensory backups, like how they can see, hear and speak in their alt-modes.

[kup]

So I take it that IDW is taking on the idea that a TFs brain/spark is in its head?

For such a technologically advanced race, it would be expected that the most vulnerable component would be in the most centrally located part of their body (the torso/chest).

Shooting anyone in the head (like Megatron or Scrapper) shouldn't kill them, at the most, it should only disable them. And even still, you'd think that they would have secondary sensory backups, like how they can see, hear and speak in their alt-modes.

Bare chested Spike killed him with his super human high jump punches.

He is badass

[SharkyMcShark]

So I take it that IDW is taking on the idea that a TFs brain/spark is in its head?

For such a technologically advanced race, it would be expected that the most vulnerable component would be in the most centrally located part of their body (the torso/chest).

Shooting anyone in the head (like Megatron or Scrapper) shouldn't kill them, at the most, it should only disable them. And even still, you'd think that they would have secondary sensory backups, like how they can see, hear and speak in their alt-modes.

Rotorstorm thinks you're right.