Written by James Roberts and John Barber
Art by Atilio Rojo, James Riaz, Nick Roche, Livid Ramondelli and Robert Gill
Published by IDW Comics
The review for last month’s issue of “Transformers: More than Meets the Eye”, the second part in the twelve-issue “Dark Cybertron” storyline that crosses over both ongoing Transformers titles, began with a pithy, if strained, analogy comparing the experience of reading the issue to being caught between two conversations of vastly different degrees of entertainment. While it would be possible to cook up a similar analogy to describe this latest issue, possibly something involving being forced to alternate between a well-crafted club sandwich and a stale PB&J but with no J, but it would be far easier to simply say that everything glaringly wrong and unsatisfying that was present last time around is still there.
The book picks up after the events of “Transformers: Robots in Disguise” issue 23 and again its focus is split between various locales and groups, all of them doing theoretically important things. After seeing Orion Pax, Rodimus and co. depart for the Dead Universe, the crew of the Lost Light, now captained by Ultra Magnus, have struck out in search of Metroplex, and find themselves in a mysterious underwater location and under attack by a minor villain group from a previous issue. Meanwhile in the Dead Universe, Pax and Rodimus stand around talking, having been given only two issues of screen-time and precious little to do with it. On Cybertron, Shockwave and Metalhawk (who for some reason works for Shockwave now, because apparently it’s not a problem that that makes no sense given everything we know about his history and character) plot to use the Space Bridge in Megatron’s chest to open a portal to the Dead Universe.
The number of unanswered questions and plot-holes in this series are piling up by the issue. Why is Shockwave working for Galvatron, especially since when Galvatron, Jihaxus and company left Cybertron in Ark-1, Shockwave was still a seemingly benevolent member of the Cybertronian Senate? Was he always evil, and the Empurata and Shadowplay procedures inflicted upon him at the end of the “Shadowplay” storyarc simply made him less subtle about it? Why does the spacebridge have to still be inside Megatron? Does it need to be bound to a spark to function? Why, again, is Metalhawk suddenly evil? Every alternate page seemingly presents more inconsistencies than anything else, and usually the one that bear John Barber’s fingerprints.
James Robinson’s input, on the otherhand, while entertaining, feels to border on inconsequential. The dialogue is snappy, and the “Rodpod” is a wonderful bit of absurdity in the otherwise “too serious for its own good” storyline, but the crew’s battle with the Ammonites feels like a distraction at best, or padding at worst. It feels like someone at IDW told Robertson “Yeah, uhh, Barber’s mostly writing talky scenes this issue…can have you have your Last Light guys fight someone?” To which Robertson replied “Lost Light. Uhh….those Ammonite guys from a few issues back”, after which he was given a reassuring pat on the head and shut back in his closet.
This feels like someone’s else’s ballgame, is what it boils down to. Shockwave, the Titans, the Dead Universe, it’s all stuff that came out of Robinson’s work on “Robots in Disguise” or the previous Transformers run by Simon Furman. The contribution by James Roberts, and all the characters and concepts he’s brought to the table, is minimal, and for readers primarily interested in Roberts’ work on the Transformers mythos and his style in general, “Dark Cybertron” is feeling increasingly like an extremely one-sided collaboration. There’s a line of dialogue, delivered by Ratchet, that sums this feeling up perfectly: “We’ve been reined in, Magnus. We’re part of the Autobot mainstream again, whether we like it or not.” Dark Cybertron is feeling more with each issue like James Roberts, and everything wonderful he brought to TF comics, is being stamped down, repressed, in favor of Robinson’s blander, more over-blown style.
It’s considered taboo around here to write in the first person, but “Transformers: More than Meets the Eye” is a series I love so much, my feelings on this issue, and indeed the Dark Cybertron storyline, can be nothing but personal. I want this to be over. I don’t care about Galvatron, or the Dead Universe, or any of the things IDW seems hell-bent on. I want the comic that made me feel the love and devotion between two robotic characters, and the heartbreak at the loss of that. I want the comic that made me laugh, that made me like the characters, and care about what happened to them. The comic that got away from the kind of over-blown epics that made Simon Furman’s later years writing “Transformers” comics miserable and lifeless, instead and focused on characters, and situations the reader can grasp without a flow chart and a dictionary of what every metaphysical cosmic hoo-haa plot device actually means. This is not my comic. My comic is in here…somewhere, and occasionally breaks the surface of the water with some clever dialogue or a submarine vaguely shaped like a main character’s head. But the rest of the time it feels like watching the comic I love drowning.
