Out Wednesday February 18, 2009.

DOn't see this on your LCS' shelves? Don't bug IDW - bug Diamond.

felt kind of like a clean-up issue. not much happened other than the reveal of which decepticons have come to earth and simmonds taking frenzy's head

Dang, Fracture looked awesome in Movieverse-style. Now that she's actually done something in the movieverse comics, she may remain on my "Movie Bots from previous toylines" shelf, where I keep the Movie toys who don't have the ILM aesthetic.


For some reason, Jolt is referred to as "Dead End" in the book. Hm.

Edit: Fracture's companions are "Movie-ized" versions of the unreleased repaints of the Energon Bruticus gestalt limbs! Check out the tanks on the page where she's talking about scanning their alt modes; they're the Energon Kickback tank. Once I figured this out, I could see how their original robot mode details had been adapted to fit the movie aesthetic.

Simple do-away with the problem that ROTF has an Autobot named Jolt with screentime. (I imagine anyway.)

Bonus that there is a ROTF Scout classed Dead End... Wich unfortunately is red, while this guys toy is purple, wich is the color of the new Autobot Jolt...

Oh this just keeps feeding itself. So I guess that's why.

Oh, right, Jolt is even on the cover of the next issue of Alliance, so I can't object to the change. (I don't expect Hasbro and Bay to have to worry about retailer exclusives like the other Jolt or Mudflap when naming in-film characters; realistically speaking, those repaint guys are pretty low on the food chain.)

In any case, G1 had two Barrages, Sky Highs and Eagle Eyes. And the Eagle Eyes and Barrages were on opposite sides. More than one guy on Cybertron can sport the same name.

Technically G1 only had the one Eagle Eye, but I get the point.

I am waiting for mine to be delivered, can anyone give a quick synopsis and cast list?

SYNOPSIS:

The Decepticons that Soundwave summoned last issue arrive on Earth (similar to how the Autobots did in the Movie). Ironhide, Bumblebee and the troops pick up the pieces from Starscream's attack. Simmons picks up Frenzy's head and hides it in his jacket without anyone else noticing. Simmons then gets a call from Keller that S7 is being disbanded and he's being let go. Prime arrives, and decides the Allspark fragment should remain with him. Jazz and the dead Decepticons (including Wreckage) are dumped into the ocean. Lennox reveals that the government wants to form an alien response team consisting of Lennox and Epps' crew and the Autobots. The new earthbound Decepticons (Fracture, Overcast, Jetstorm, Dropkick, Incinerator, and two of the Bruticus limbs apparently) scan their new Earth modes. Swindle and Dead End prepare to form a "distraction" in San Francisco. Prime and Lennox's team engage in training, when they get word of Swindle and Dead End's attack, and ROLL OUT to combat it."

CAST LIST:

Autobots: Bumblebee, Ironhide, Prime, Ratchet
Decepticons: Wreckage (dead), Megatron (dead), Fracture, Overcast, Jetstorm, Dropkick, Incinerator, Swindle, "Dead End" (its Jolt, the purple Crosswise repaint)
Humans: Simmons, Lennox, Epps, Keller

Now I wish my order would arrive. I want to see these characters who never made it into fiction before!

Jolt is also an Alfa Romeo 147.

And Swindle has Chevrolet logos.

Weird, this "Dead End" looks like Jolt, buy Jolt's bio says he was created on Earth by the Allspark during the battle at Mission City. So this isn't really Jolt, not is it Dead End from ROTF.

I noticed the Chevy symbol on Swindle too. Isn't he a Cobalt?

Although unnamed, movie Reverb and Gunbarrel appear, but have more movie-styled robot forms and their vehicle forms are more earth-like than their toys. They also seem to have landed in Italy.

So the four bots on the cover, they are Fracture, Reverb, Gunbarrel and Overcast?

I also wonder if they will keep things in scale for the comic. The car Transformers should stand about 15 feet tall or so, but the big ones like Reverb and Gunbarrel, though Scouts, should be Blackout and Brawl size. Meanwhile Jetstorm, based on a real world jet of similar type (an AN-225) would stand over 200 feet tall! Will he tower over the others in the comic?

Finally got a copy of this today, no thanks to the screwyness that was this issue's release. Gonna have to wait for MaxDinos #3 to get here via eBay, unfortunately. *grumble grumble*

Anyway, yeah, more cleanup, more setup for the next film - seems Epps wasn't the only one to get a promotion. Love seeing Fracture get some time in the Spotlight at last - here's hoping we see a few more non-movie guys (that didn't appear in RoS) in the final part, and I'm especially glad for that "Roll out!" at the end. Makes me a happy geek. :-)

Alliance #4 can't come soon enough. Here's hoping it doesn't have any shipping issues.

Honestly, I'm just happy with this because it seems to cement the direction I want to see the Movie line go in: basically, a complete military team-up between the Autobots and the humans. We got a bit of that at the end of the first Movie and I'm glad to see it remaining. I can only hope ROTF does the same.

This series has just BARELY had enough happening to keep me buying. Barely. This felt like it should have been the first issue, or the second at very most.

I can't say I really care much about anything that anybody's doing. Yes, they dumped the Decepticons in the ocean. Guess what! We already knew that! A bunch of Decepticons have come to Earth! Okay! I don't know who any of them are!

Also, did we mention that the humans and the Autobots are a team now? One team? United? To fight together? As a team? A united team that is united and fights together when they must fight, which they will do together, united as one team?

It's not bad; it's just... dull.

Some of the characters appearing in this story are:

-Fracture (the race car, redeco of Classics Mirage, a Walmart exclusive toy)
-Overcast (a figher jet, a black redeco of Dreadwing)
-Jetstorm (jumbo jet, a Toys R Us store exclusive)
-Dropkick (a blue pickup)
-Incinerator (the V-22 Osprey helicopter)
-Swindle (the red Chevy Cobalt car)

We saw two Decepticons with Fracture who scanned a helicopter and tank, but they were unnamed. They seem to be the unreleased Target store exclusives Reverb and Gunbarrel. Neat how delayed/canceled toys still got cameos in the comic.

Also, we see a purple car with Swindle who is named Dead End. He seems to be a variant of the toy named Jolt (a Walmart exclusive), but they changed the body style a little and changed his name. Weird.

What does this leave us for movie toy characters from the first film that never appeared in the comics? The Toys R Us exclusive Mudflap toy? Anyone else? Even Inferno had a brief cameo in the prequel, but his Mini-Con Longarm hasn't appeared. I don't remember Storm Surge appearing in any comic, or the unreleased Autobot motorcycle Backtrack.

We also have yet to see any sign of Big Daddy, and I'm pretty sure we haven't seen Crosshairs either.

And the lack of Mini-Con Longarm isn't a shocker - it was probably easier to package the Mini-Con with Inferno (and thus maintain the Mini-Con activated gimmicks) rather than drop him altogether.

Crosshairs was a decently prominent supporting guy in Reign of Starscream; he appeared as one of Arcee's friends who she hooks up with on Cybertron, and tended to get more speaking lines than most others in that group.

Okay then...obviously, I needed to check over the individual RoS entries at the wiki.

So right now the movie toy characters who havn't appeared in any fiction are:

Backtrack
Big Daddy
Longarm (Mini-Con)
Jolt (we got "Dead End" who looks like him)
Mudflap
Storm Surge

And some of the Real Gear Figures.

Also, if you count the characters from the 3D card game we have not seem Mirage, Swerve and Jetfire yet.

Storm Surge is in the Titan comics.

cool. I guess i need that issue.