Transformers Overview 2

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The Comic Nerd - December 2006

Transformers Comic Overview Part 2: British Invasion!

December 11th 2006 08:23

If you read my blog a couple of days ago, you should be well informed about Marvel's Transformers comics. However, there's more than I previously revealed. Over in Merrie Olde England there was Marvel UK, and they were doing there own Transformers series. To begin with it just reprinted the US series, but there was a snag - comics in the UK are generally released on a weekly basis. Logic dictated that the US material, being released monthly as it was, would not be sufficient to fill the space. So off they went and commissioned new material, and a related yet completely new continuity was born.

To begin with, the UK stories didn't exactly fit in with the US stuff. There's a vague attempt to mesh the stories, but there really aren't any gaps where they fit. That would change later on, as the UK comic continued to reprint the US material, while creating it's own stuff that wove in and around it.

The first UK strip was entitled "Man of Iron", written by Steve Parkhouse (much better known for his work on 2000 AD). As is the way of things, it's set in England, and features an Autobot shuttle sent to rescue Prime and his crew. It's a much more human-centric tale than the US comic had been to date, and it's not bad. The Transformers come across as much more alien than usual, which is especially jarring if you've only ever seen the cartoon. I like the effect - these are giant robots from another planet, not John Wayne in a big truck suit.

Man of Iron isn't the historic tale, however. That honour belongs to the next strip, The Enemy Within, as it features the first Transformers work of Simon Furman. Bob Budiansky may have basically created the Transformers, but Simon Furman is the reason they're still starring in comics today. He wrote the UK title for almost it's entire run, wrote almost half of the US title, worked on the relaunch in 2000, and is currently in charge of all things Transformer at comics company IDW. He took a serial toy ad and gave it a mythic scope and real characters.

Unfortunately, Furman's first few strips are quite forgettable. (It seems Simon agrees, becaus he's refused to allow them to be reprinted!) It's not until later, with a few scripts under his belt that Furman blossomed. He latched onto some characters that the US series was neglecting, such as the Dinobots, and his material began to pull ahead of Budiansky's. The best was yet to come.

Transformers: The Movie was released in 1986. While this marked a downturn in quality for the US series (as detailed two days ago), it had the opposite effect in the UK. The movie was set in the year 2005, and featured a number of characters that were not going to appear in the US. Furman jumped at this opportunity, and turned the movie cast into his own. Thus was born Target: 2006, the defining moment of Transformers UK.

The plot is pretty simple: Galvatron, a powerful Decepticon from the year 2006, has jumped back in time to the present day to escape from servitude. This results in a series of brutal fights, where Galvatron hands everyone and their uncle their own asses. Some Autobots travel back to stop him, and the Autobot Ultra Magnus comes from Cybertron to fight as well. It's honestly just an excuse for a whole lot of cool fight scenes, but it's got enough character moments and a quick enough pace that it works really well. More importantly, it gave Furman his own cast to play with. He was able to stretch out and write his arcs without fear of being contradicted by the US title, and his work blossomed from this point on.

Furman started writing parallel stories at this point. He continued to write stories set between issues of the US comic, but he also used the future setting that followed the movie as well (pretty much ignoring what the cartoon did, which is an admirable tactic). Galvatron continued to menace the Transformers of the 1980s. Characters that were never featured in the US comic got to appear in the UK. It all culminated in the Time Wars, the epic that ended the whole Galvatron/time travel saga, and changed the timestream so that the future depicted would never be possible.

It was at this point that Furman got the nod to write the US series, and so the UK title was neglected. It started to run a lot of reprint strips, and the UK-only material reverted to black and white. There were still stories to be had, but nothing on the scale of Furman's previous efforts - those types of stories were being saved for the US title now! The title lasted until issue #332, finishing shortly after it's US counterpart. The title achieved almost legendary status amongst Transformers fans, as it was much better than the US title and much harder to find. It has since been almost completely reprinted, and is still held in high regard - this is the pinnacle of Transformers, in any medium you care to name.

HIGHLIGHTS:

Just about the whole run is a highlight, but I'll concentrate below on the really essential stuff. By no means restrict yourself to the titles below! If you enjoy those, check out the others - all of the others.

Volume 2: Target: 2006

Galvatron travels back from the future to wreck some shit. Brutal fight scenes, some good character moments, and the story arc that started all the awesome stuff. You'll definitely want to begin here.

Volume 5: Fallen Angel

Galvatron returns! This is another excuse for ridiculous fight scenes between really big robots, including an awesome one between Galvatron and Ultra Magnus on top of a volcano. This arc introduces the robot mercenary Death's Head, who would go on to star in a number of his own comics. It's basically Target: 2006, but a bit more polished up. Still good reading if you like big robot fights, though.

Volume 9: Time Wars

All of Galvatron's time-jumping starts to have an effect, as reality is being torn asunder. It's the epic culmination of pretty much all of Furman's major UK plots. The ending is a touch rushed, but it's just so epic and grand that I can't help but love it. (Plus, it's got more cool fights.)

Tomorrow: The Dreamwave relaunch! Pat Lee buys lots of porches with Hasbro money!

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Posted By: Nathan P. Mahney - Category: No Category

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Comments

1 Comments. [ Add A Comment ]

Comment by Cibbuano

January 11th 2007 21:48

Hunt Famous
Orble Post of the Day
Fat Cult
Techbreak

wonderful post!

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