yes, i know this goes in the comics forum but no one made a thread in there for this yet and it tells me i can't make threads in there

so, it was almost kind of the same as the other 2. a little more story, more dialogue between the cons. the most intriguing part for me was HIGHLIGHT to view:
REFLECTOR!!!!!!! all three are alive and well in ahm!!!! decent issue and it looks like they will finally get some things really rolling in issue 4

well maybe its set long before that one guy's spotlight.

yeah, maybe. i was just totally blown away to see said bot(s)

and there's a conversation between megs and starscream that still has been a little confused. it sort of felt like megs was telling starscream that he has more potential than he realizes

Hm, may have to rethink the "All Fail Megatron" fan-moniker.

That was actually good. McCarthy stops hugging around with pointless and bland "Decepticons are KEWL!" moments (for the most part) and gives us some actual characterization.

If he can manage to stay away from the tired and predictable "Starscream behind-the-back coup" subplot that always inevitably creeps up, we might have something here.

actually, i kinda got a vibe that maybe megatron WANTS starscream to lead the decepticons when he's ready to step aside!

Cool Trevor Hutchinson cover. Check.

Strong Guido artwork. Check.

Cinematic feel. Check.

Story progression. Very, very little.

Before I get into criticisms though, I want to say, I do understand the feel Shane is going for here. It does seem cinematic in a way, and despite it's comparisons to the cartoon, I don't really get that same vibe these past two issues. I think Shane is going for an "invasion" kind of feel, something global, as felt from the perspective of mankind. Which I think he has achieved, and which I have enjoyed. I enjoy the way Shane is letting Guido's art tell the story.

Also on the plus, we get some character development and hints of history between Megs and Screamer. I actually find it quite intriguing, and the dialogue is a welcome change from the "-ations" series.

But the pacing and story progression? Oh momma.

A major flaw here, possibly fatal. This series thus far has made Infiltration seem like.....like Revelations!

I mean, one has to question, that if Marvel's main title for the year, Secret Invasion, can achieve what it has set out to do in an eight issue series, surely AHM could have followed suit?

What I have seen, I haved enjoyed. Problem is, I have seen very little in terms of actual story progression. Twelve dollars in, we should be seeing much, much more than we have. I mean, cut some of those panel sizes in half. There doesn't have to be more dialogue, just more page space.

I see potential here, I really do. But the way things are going, that potential will only be met in trade paperback format.

Give it a "B-".

yeah, the Starscream/Megs exchange helped a lot, but there still is a ways to go in terms of filling the issue with actual plot. Still, it is getting better, I must admit that. But not better faster enough.

Yeah - I get the impression Megatron sees Starscream as an equal, as a successor who's nearly worthy of following in his footsteps.

I mean, really. When you think about it, what Starscream did in Infiltration and Devastation is pretty darn impressive. The dude not only takes the initiative when it presents himself like a true Decepticon, but he doesn't let "getting a hole shot through his chest" get in the way of talking straight to his leader.

He's not afraid of Megatron. And that may very well be why Megatron respects Starscream as much as he does.

Compared to the previous issues this one is still a massive step up.

We actually got some characterization in between the scenes of pointless destruction.



Secret Invasion has much the same problem, the first five issues were "fight in the Savage land."

Then the six came along which, in the course of 20 odd pages, got the heroes from there to New York and a fight started...to be resolved in the following issues.

Meh...we've gotten a little characterization, not much plot development, and stellar art.

At the same time though...I'm not seeing much hope here. New York, LA, San Diego, San Fran, DC all under assault, people getting blown up in subway stations. Granted, it's always darkest before the dawn and all that, but can we at least get some ray of hope?

I don't want a squad of Autobots coming in to save the day...just some successful resistance. A sane decision like carpet bombing Manhattan, Russia lobbing a nuke or three, frag - that new guy Drift showing up, anything! Give me a reason beyond good artwork to keep up with the series!


...and before anyone carps, carpet bombing is the very sane response to this situation, even with lots of potential human casualties. Assuming they had the capacity - and considering Witwicky brought up that idea, it's not exactly impossible.

I would've liked to have seen which Decepticons are attacking the west coast, seeing as how the 1984-84 cast is with Megatron.

Apparently the subway tunnels in NYC have expanded since the last time I was there. How else do you explain a steam engine being able to traverse them? And speaking of which, Astrotrain apparently decided to swap train modes on a whim.

I enjoyed this more than the first two.

Mostly because of Megatron and Starscream's talk, it actually makes me want to pick up Megatron Origins.

I'm curious who the other Decepticons attacking all over were, but I'm sure they'll name them or we'll see them eventually.

I didn't even think of Wheelie's spotlight when I saw Reflector, a lot of times they were stock solders in the G1 cartoon.

Daniel "Sparkplug" Witwicky, huh? So is he an all new Witwicky or did Daniel just decided to take his Grandfathers nickname at some point of his life?

"I didn't expect a hell of a lot from a man who thought a Jaguar was a dog." "That was a Jaguar?"

Well, the dialog in the military command center suggests that this has been happening over a few days.

Odds are most of the 'cons from issue 1 (the Seekers, Blitzwing, the Insecticons) are off attacking the west coast, while Megs lords over the conquered NYC, the Constructicons start building something, while Starscream joins Megs after downing Air Force One, and Astrotrain has fun.

Seriously, I think the whole "train taking out the subway stations" is less an order from Megatron and more "Astrotrain cutting loose and having fun." Which adds a new dimension to his personality.

A classic dimension, really -- it's like they read his original Tech Specs and expanded bio, and turned it directly into a scene.

Seeing G1 toy Astrotrain loco turn into Classics toy Astrotrain robot is one of the more "Buh-wuuuuuh?" transformation oddities in these comics since "Prime transforms exactly like the masterpiece toy right down to two grills".

Yes, this was the best issue yet. I agree that the panels were too big in some cases, but the flow of the story was quite good. It does set up the whole "there's no one that can help you" feeling. Thus far, this has been highly cinematic.

As far as Astrotrain, he was a good plot element. At first people get hope of a rescue, then blam! Also using a steam locomotive in a dark tunnel is creapier in my opinion than a bullet train. Also, it's not really a stretch of the imagination that "G1 Astrotrain" could have Classic's Astrotrain's feet. The shuttle nose folded in in G1 whereas in Classics, it split.

And I was right about the Ravage Jaguar / Dog joke (vindicated!).

Three strikes, and you're out. I dropped it from my pull at the comic shop today.

not read this issue yet but I don't really care if i get spoiled by reading this topic - just keep reading these issue discussion topics to see what you're missing at least.

Oh look...it's the third part of ISSUE #1.

This again, was awesome.

Astrotrain's arrivial at the end was the only time a decepticon's instilled a sense of dread in me as a reader. I like these humans, I liked the action-film tone of the comic, and I look forward to the Autobots making their appearance next issue.

Soooooo damn Dreamwavey. I just feel like this series has squandered so much of what Furman took the effort to set up in *ation.

Yep, this issue also had one of the best Megatron-Starscream conversations to date; the two having a calm discussion in which Megs acknowledges Starscream's abilities, ala Escalation...I really enjoyed the exchange, as it showed me that the smarter dynamic Furman established between these two in this universe as colleagues, old friends, even, who can carry on an intelligent conversation without constant petty backbiting is intact. Starscream brings the sarcasm and Megatron the diss, but they don't feel like the bickering couple from the cartoon. XD Megatron's conversation with Hook was very good, too; Hook was totally in-character.

Really, from these examples down to Astrotrain still serving as the capable second in command with his tactical advice re:ballistics last issue, I have to say Shane seems to not only know these characters, but the way they should be written in this 'verse. I like these humans, but hope to see some robot-heavy action, too, so we can see him do more of this kind of thing.

Decepticons do...not function well without stuff to destroy, as we see. I got the impression that they'd already won, and they're just wandering around causing mass panic now just to have something to do.

Moreover, glad to see this is just one part of a huge military campaign, which said to me that the story is still within the "Strategic movement of armies" mold that has been established for these Decepticons, as opposed to the more cartoon-like "Isolated bands attacking seemingly insignificant targets."

The fact that Megatron appears to be planning to build...something...(His Earthbase?) in such a prominent place is very Rhythms of Darkness, too. Neat.

All the Con units everywhere are on the move...yikes. I liked the fact that this wasn't revealed up-front, but rather gradually, with our initially thinking this was an isolated strike, perhaps petty, and then having had the grand scope of it revealed. What made it scary for me, too, was how so much of the destruction was depicted between issues, for instance Devastator only making the brief appearance, and then skipping ahead to the city already being subjugated, meaning the damage has been done and is irreversible.

Hope next issue, since it takes us off-planet, also shows some of the Cons' conquests of other planets.
Also, man, Andy's, like, gonna have to have his ass saved by an Autobot one of these days...his encounters with Astrotrain and Ravage really play up how HUGE these things are, something I liked from the early IDW issues. That final panel of Astrotrain...geez...

I AM a sucker for emotional appeals, I'll admit...these comics are striking all the chords in me in terms of drama that the author intended, including sharing Sparkplug's feelings of hopelessness, and sympathizing with that dad. (Hope he shows up again...as much as I love Astrotrain showing up to say "boo," it would be almost TOO mean just to kill them off like that. )

*Hi5*

What he said

After reading this issue, I said "Finally, we're getting where we need to be." Seriously, this issue was 1 million times better than the first two put together. There was so much characterization for everyone. I love how the 'Cons are acting and what they're doing. It should just get better from here, seeing as there really is no one to fight them, we may actually get what I thought we would get from issue one, Megatron turning the US into a dictatorship under his command and use Nazi-like propaganda tactics to help take over the world while the Autobots put up a feeble resistance. Looks like the next issue may be more Autobot-centric so hopefully we'll get some more questions answered and move the story forward even more. I'm really hoping we don't get too much Autobot action, though. I kind of want the reverse distribution of character development than what we've gotten in the -ation series up to this point, about a 70-30 mix favoring the 'cons. I really want to see McCarthy's Decpticons get some serious character development, as they are some of the coolest ones, from what little we've gotten, we've gotten in a while. I especially want more Thundercracker vs Starscream and Skywarp. I love the idea of a seeker who is not totally in agreement with the pointless destruction they're causing. I think that's just a really cool idea.

Finally read #3 tonight and I gotta say I'm loving this story. I really love how huge the Cons seem, how many of the art panels are more from a human viewpoint. Jeez just look how big Rumble looks! Rumbles actually scary!

The conversation with Starscream was awesome, I felt like Megatron has respect for 'Screamer, and I LOVED that he pulled down a chunk of the US flag and was polishing his cannon while he talked. Little things like that are really making me like this story. I liked seeing the old steam engine in a NY tunnel, that alone had the guy screaming, "Code Red!" He knew right away, what's a steam engine doing in a NY subway? Because it's creepy, good storytelling, and would scare the hell out of the human survivors.

Rumble blowing up a VW bug talking about how much he hates them? C'mon, that's awesome.

the conversation about "confusing a Jaguar with a Dog", brilliant. I've seen that conversation on this board or Seibertron and I was kinda surprised to see that conversation in a comic story, caught me off guard but in a good way.

It's very fast paced and cinematic which is cool, and every issue leaves me wondering what's gonna happen next. It definitely leaves you with more questions then answers, but I think the pacing of the story is actually really good. Comics are just too short these days, lol.

In TPB I think this is going to be an amazing story. Honestly if I had the first 12 issues in TPB the story really feels like one that would pull you in and not let up the tension until you get to the end of the book. I really think you'd sit there and read it cover to cover and not notice time going by.

The art is absolutely beautiful and a real joy to look at, I can't get enough of this story.

And I think Megs might be building a base, but I hope he has a huge statue of himself erected in NY to further humilate and demoralize the fleshlings.


I've got all the IDW's but this one really has me hanging on each month to see what'll happen. I just really love the feel of the story, the depressing "realness" of a 'Con invasion, the speed of the stories, the art. It's all awesome.

Can't wait for the next one.

Just got it. Definitely better than the first two issues, but still a little slow. But I'm really glad to see that the new Megs/Screamer interaction from earlier IDW continuity is still present here. Gives me hope that the rest of the stuff will tie in nicely.

Also, no one's commented on Megs'/Screamer's comments on how they took over...

Megatron: "A systematic simultaneous, galaxy-wide assault brought about by one of their own. It's almost painfully delicious."
Starscream: "Treachery is in the heart of all creatures. They were fools not to expect it."

Who do you guys think they're talking about? It's not even clear if he's talking about the Autobots or the humans... but it's probably one of those, which would either limit it to A) Mirage, following the events in Spotlight: Mirage, or B) the facsimile the Decepticons grew to run for President of the U.S. If the latter, Starscream's trip to Washington taking down Air Force One might've been to dispose of the facsimile. (Personally, based on the dialogue, I'd guess he's referring to Mirage though, since he's talking about "galaxy-wide" rather than just Earth).

The traitor being Mirage would require knowledge of past IDW canon.

Something AHM has been pretty short on.

...it'll probably turn out to be Drift.

No knowledge of past continuity, like when they referenced the Machination! And when Megatron and Starscream retailed their character dynamic from earlier in the series!

Hopefully the next issue should be the first good one all the way through.

This one only had a few good pages.

I suspect not simply because that would be too obvious.

I myself would love for it to turn out to be Prime himself.

As for why? After Nemesis Prime's confrontation with him, and after all these years of war, it's starting to weigh on Prime - he's wondering what the point of it all is. And comes to believe that defeat is inevitable.

So he engineers a swift defeat so as to not drag it out.

Omega Supreme would be someone who could work well as well, given his traditional role of a "last line of defense".

That was like a sentence and less a reference then simply "we're shoving this out of way now."



That's THEIR character dynamic.

If McCarthy didn't like that, like half the cast's previous bodies, it would've been changed.

Well, ya did say "knowledge," and he apparently at least knows of it.
*Works off stress built up during midterms through savage hair-splitting!*

And to be fair, I'm a fan of the idea of Transformers being able to switch alt modes and the cosmetic details of their bodies whenever they want to (Within certain parameters, of course), for instance how Blitzwing changed tank models when he went to Brasnya, so I have no real problem with some of the crew having new looks. In fact, it's kinda nice to be able to look at some of my Classics and think, "Hey, IDW toys!" My being fine with it of course also might be an issue with my preferring, say, the Masterpiece Seeker design to the F-22 (Heck, even EJ posted in the IDW Boards that he prefers F-15 Seekers. XD).

Plus an old-style train in a subway is just scary (Adds to the wrongness of the situation), which works for me, since I figure A-Train's just getting his kicks at this point, same as how some of the other Cons who aren't anything more than warriors are wandering around blowing stuff up.

Still reeks of "wrong" - Classics Astrotrain robot mode (near enough) transforming into G1 Astrotrain train mode? Use G1 Astrotrain or Classics Astrotrain, not both.

Ehm, have you taken a look at G1 Astrotrain (the toy) recently? AHM Astrotrain is just G1 Astrotrain slightly reworked by Guido to be more proportional and with different feet so the space shuttle cockpit acts as the feet instead of just swinging underneath.

It is no different from what Don did for pretty much everyone in the DW ongoing- slightly reworked their usual designs so they worked better as humanoid robots and not toys. That said, I do certainly prefer EJ's Astrotrain design or even Classics rather than "G1 for the sake of being G1" here...

Besides, I still say "old-style train in a subway tunnel" is just spooky, and that's part of why it was used. I found that whole scene immensely creepy. Of course, I should note in all fairness that the emotional appeal in a movie, book or comic almost *always* affects me or pulls me in as it's designed to. You'd think they would have wrung that softness out of me while I was earning my English Lit degree, but nah. I get invested in things really easily.

I thought the Steam Engine in a subway was creepy too. That was one of my favorite parts. It's all so surreal and wrong. You knew instantly even if you'd never seen a 'Con that something was deeply wrong.

nothing wrong with being emotionally invested in a story either. If they didn't have that effect we wouldn't be telling stories for thousands of years.

One of the things I really like about the comics and the new movie (though the new movie more insinuated then actually showed) was that the 'Cons are alien invaders who look at humans like bugs. Noone feels bad about stepping on a bug. They're killers, and that's what I've always wanted to see. I loved the cartoons as a kid, and I still do. But you do get tired of watching Shockwave shoot 20 laser blasts and not hit a single thing. The more realistic tone and heightened level of violence in the comics is what keeps me going back for more. That's more what'd actually be like.

And in general the IDW and Dreamwave comics just seem to have richer stories since they can take thier time fleshing out the story.

So is this how its going to be from now on - even if IDW keep producing Transformers comics for many years to come, are we going to see reboots like AHM every two years which effectively does away with what came before it?

Good for new readers but a real let down to those who have been with IDW since the beginning.

The first three issues can be summed up in one small sentence - "The Decepticons are evil aliens who destroy us powerless humans."

WE ALREADY KNEW THAT! There's just nothing new for me to enjoy finding out. Revelations may have been rushed for reasons beyond its control but its more enjoyable because a lot more things happen.

The next issue of AHM looks interesting though because it moves away from the Decepticons.

Not really fair comparing the conclusion to a looooong story arc, to AHM (which has only just started)



It will be if the new direction doesn't sell either, or G1 Transfomer comics will simply no longer be published. You know why we're having this reboot now. It would have been great to see the old story just get a little tweaked here and there, but the whole idea is to bring new people on board. Keeping all these old elements from Furman's story would make it harder to do so. Now, I really don't see this new take selling much better than the old stories, but you can't blame IDW for at least trying to boost the sales numbers a bit.

Personally, I do like AHM, but the slow pace has made me feel it's just not worth the effort of picking up single issues anymore. I'll buy the last 3 singles, and than switch to buying TPBs after that.
That pretty much now goes for all TF comics.....and I would think the problem for IDW here is, that by the time the TPB is released, I might not care anymore about picking it up.

The thing is that while Furman's writing is what keeps the old comic fans around (although if you ask me, his work is getting tiresome and repetitive), casual fans want to read about characters the way they remember them in the toon.

So there's a conflict of interest right there.

I say to hold our horses until we declare that everything's being chucked out the window. For instance, McCarthy's HIGHLIGHT to view:
in talking about using Kup again, was well-aware that he's been in that CR chamber, and said we'd find out what he'd been up to since then. Or it's like being so quick to describe Drift as a Mary Sue; Sure, I obsessively read the IDW Boards for news, but it's already been stated that he's more along the lines of a white guy who wants to be/thinks he's Japanese.

If there's one thing this fandom is great at, it's jumping to the absolute wrong conclusions, and we've been proven wrong pretty much every time we do it. Animated will be unpopular/bad (Based on that one image of Prime): Uhhhhm no. The movie will fail: Uhmmm-huh... Armada will be great: Yeahhhh, right... (Well, the toys were pretty good, once I got used to how different they were than RID. The show was worse than I could have ever expected.)

I always adopt a "wait and see" attitude in life. ^ ^ That said, I like the story as-is, but part of the reason is that I'm quite happy reading extended action sequences in a comic book, and consider that part of legitimate content. I dunno...I read plenty of manga, too, which can be heavy on the action and lighter on dialogue; perhaps that informs my perspective.

In any case, I've been wanting Guido on a regular G1 book for years because I find his ability to combine G1 cartoon aesthetics and the kind of detail that Dreamwave made more of a standard practice so pleasing, so I'm just soaking up the visual goodness at this point. If I had one complain about some of the earlier TF comic work, it was that the panels were at times too small.

I might not be the best one to ask, though. Story-wise, I liked pretty much everything Dreamwave did, after all, with my only issues lying with Pat Lee's and Rob Ruffolo's artwork, and I felt pretty burned when that continuity came to a close. So I can understand the frustration of people who aren't happy with things being shaken up.

Well all I heard about the "otaku" piece is an offhand remark from Guido. Shane, meanwhile, said he's "one of the Autobots' heavy hitters", which reeks of Mary Sue.

Really? The only manga I read is Captain Harlock, and that's quite dialogue-heavy. In a good way.

I don't see why Drift can't be both, to be honest. Like the one where he's sitting around in a whole "Check me out, yeah!" pose while Hot Rod and Springer are fighting for their lives in the background. Anyhoo, new writers don't, I feel, have to make the characters they bring into the mix relative weaklings out of some deference; why not have a powerful, bold character who grabs the reader's attention? The only issue might be with the fact that there are lots of existing characters who could be used instead, but I'm somewhat easy to please: the new guy's cool-looking, so I tend to go "Ooh".

I read/have read tons of manga. Some is dialogue-heavy (Which is good), other series end up being more fast-paced, focused on telling you just enough dialogue (Often witty, definitely enjoyable to read). There's as much of a mix as in American comics. And far be it from me to claim to be against dialogue-heavy comics: I love Furman's stuff, and one of my favorite classic comic runs was Chris Claremont's 1970s to early 90s stint on X-Men. (I haven't been able to evalute his newer stuff for myself, but that's only because I pretty much just read the old reprints at this point; I have a thing about wanting to start a story from the beginning.)

But back to manga, heck, one of my favorite series, Blame! will go entire chapters telling you maybe, three sentences of dialogue, with the rest of the focus being the gorgeous artwork. Man, that would drive some Transfans up the wall...although seeing Tsutomu Nihei take on Cybertron and Cybertronians would be deliciously creepy. ^ ^

I enjoyed what I read of Blame! but Snikt sucked so I'd rather not see him tackle any American properties again...

Perhaps, but I'm more interesting in Transformers being put through different artists' visual filters, so if he were paired up with an author who knew Transformers, I think it could be cool. (The Japanese, bless 'em, just have trouble writing Transformers. ). Of course, if people were up in arms about "Bayformers," Nihei-formers would really enrage them. Heheheh...

And while this made for a logical idea (the need to switch up a comic to attract new readers, EVERY comic series does this) the problem is that casual fans don't keep buying the comics. The long-timers do. AHM #1 actually sold LESS than Devastation #1 did.

Don't get me wrong - I'd rather have AHM than no comic at all, its just that three issues of Revelations is the same length and cost as three issues of AHM and in that respect, Revelations is more enjoyable to me as I feel like I was getting more action and story per issue for a good price whereas with AHM, the issues so far feel pretty empty and overpriced for what I am getting. I'll be buying all twelve issues regardless of quality - I'm a sucker for Transformers comics.

Oh come on, that's a bit of a misleading statement.

It sold ONE copy less. The way you worded it made it sound like a vast difference.

http://issuu.com/idwpublishing/docs/ahm4/3...amp;layout=grey

Now this looks like what I've been after the first three issues.

Sales: 13238 copies

where did you find this info?