Possibly out Wednesday April 15, 2009. If not, whenever it comes out.

Oh yes it is... and have to say sweet.

HIGHLIGHT to view:
Screamer shows his true colors

and

HIGHLIGHT to view:
On both Cybertron and Earth.... The calvary arives

i think the final two issues are gonna be an all out, big time fight! i was actually looking through the issue while driving home from the comic book store, and i totally marked out when i saw the full spread of HIGHLIGHT to view:
OMEGA SUPREME!!!!!!

nice to see starscream kickin off his little rebellion. still wonder who the shadowy figure was standing behind him a few issues ago, though. really surprised to see frenzy up and about already

Well, I'd say this was worth the wait.

I love Roadbuster's remarks about the cannon - makes me immedately think of Jayne from 'Firefly'. And now I'm hearing Adam Baldwin for the big lug.

If it makes anyone feel better, Kup finally got rid of the 'cigar'.

I'm also wondering if Starscream's use of the phrase "War Without End" might be a legitimate nod to the fandom. Doubtful, but it'd be cool.

Mirage and Ironhide fighting side by side...gives me some pleasant memories of the second Dreamwave limited series. Say what you will about the 'Bots, they know which side they're on.

Also, the Biggest Damn Hero of them all...hot slag, that was sweet. Plus, easy solution for getting the 'Bots off Cybertron. Who else will they call in, after all...Sky Lynx?

So yeah, we've got the stage set for one very impressive conclusion. Assuming Devastator's still standing, he's gonna have something against him that he didn't last time.

Also, can anyone identify the exact make of fighter jet from the last page? I'm thinking Sukhoi, but I'm no expert on aircraft.

Damn, Megatron is a G. He basically walked into his own ambush and when the Constructicons joined the fun (against him), he basically said 'bring it on!' He's not scared of fighting Devastator, Starscream, and the bugs all by himself.... even a little bit!

That was hugging awesome.

My predictions in the last thread appear to have been off the mark, but I'm happier for it!

The Megatron scenes were amazing, and packed full of the stuff that made me like Dreamwave's G1 Issue 10 (the last one before DW went under) so much.

The Swarm scenes were fun and exciting, and I really liked Omega's big entrance, I really did not see that coming (and it's nice to be proven wrong just when you think you've got a story figured out).

Prime's had more character in this one issue than he's had in Furman's entire run IMO (I was so bored with Prime by the end of Revelation).

The little nugget's of characterisation, the art being better this issue than it was in the last...yeah, I loved it.

I like the series enough but come on.....We're down for the count and in approxamtely 8 or so pages over 2 issues and "we're back" This has an 80's cartoon feel to it you know??....I mean don't get me wrong I LOVE Omega but last we saw him he was half beaten by Monstructor....And all he can come up with is "I am Omega Supreme"?? I do have to say I love Megs taking it to them...The page with him holding up Devastators fist was pretty cool.

Transformers comics week 4/15/2009

In which everyone always gets Hot Rod's message!

I don't understand Walky? I don't have the issue yet, but is this in reference to previous issue?

Remember how Hot Rod was sending off a message, and thought he was 'rescued' by other Autobots who heard it, but they just kind of stumbled onto him?

This issue, he really IS rescued because of his message actually being heard.

Oh, Thanks!

he's also referencing a message he sent in maximum dinobots to a certain cop-like figure who wanted to make some arrests

My new all time favorite Megatron image.

SP

The fight between Megatron and Devastator was great. I just wish this story was put toghether a bit better. This could have been a okay 6 parter if it had been set up a bit better.

Anyone else think that picture of Megatron holding Devastator's fist was sort of simalir to that issue where Spiderman has to lift that heavy machinery he was under. Maybe thats why they did the "Megatron no more cover".

He's rescued in BOTH new comics today because of a message he sent a long time ago having been answered! Dues ex answeringmachina! And he's so happy to learn that someone got his message. I like to imagine him constantly texting everyone for help. Like Shattered Glass Ravage, but not for attention, more for small favors.

I think it would've been a great six parter.

I'm sure once all twelve issues are out someone will edit it down to such.

Since Omega Supreme was in it, I decided to download this and give it a more thorough looking over than the usual flick thhrough I have at my LCS.

I am actually somewhat surprised to finally have an issue of AHM that didn't piss me off.

Not to say I necassarily liked it, but it's easily the best issue so far.

While I wasn't expecting Omega to appear, I'm not massively surprised to see him coming to the Autobots rescue. He's a pre movie Character, and he was Devastators main rival in the old Cartoon. Obvious really. Does seem to have regressed to the more simple speech patterns of the old toon too, which is an inconsistencey I'm basicly indifferent too.

I am rather dissapointed that Starscreams infiltration team didn't stand by him. As a group they've put their lives at risk twice already sidding with him over Megatron, and the fact that Screamer clearly inspirred the respect of those under his command to such a degree was something I'd really liked about this version of him. Hopefully now the lines been drawn and he's got Devastator more of them will jump ship.

It did all read very quickly though. the fact it was basicly two big fights didn't help. Lots of stuff comes totally out of left field too, the human assualt, which ever country they belong to, the cons that sided with Starscream and Omega comming out of literally nowhere all could have benefited from some foreshadowing.

But all in all it wasn't bad.

I thought it was simplistic and poorly-paced as always. But hey, it's purty. I half-expected Roadbuster to be destroyed again by an overloading gun, but he actually ditched it this time and used it to crush more enemies.

Reread it, and mulled it other for a bit, and I've had a few more thoughts.

Firstly, I've worked out why I liked the earth bits: it's basically repeating stuff from Infiltration. Starscream's speech, Megatrons reaction and lack of dying immediately and showing how ridiculously powerful he is are all stuff we saw in issue 6, the only difference, other than the use of a Gestalt instead or Ore 13, is that this time there's an interruption before Megatron can shoot a big hole in anybody.

Secondly, I really can't see what the point of the Swarm was. It added conflict to the Autobot side of the story, but having actual Decepticons after them instead would have meant you could still have that, and have some more characterisation, which would have been especially nice for a series that was advertised to be focusing on the Cons.

The swarm was never scary either. It took this long for them to actually get any real numbers on panel, and they get taken out by Omega. Hell, they’ve not done anything to anyone so far, the only casualties been Sunstreaker, and he killed himself. All they've done is make Megatron contradict his earlier characterisation, and give a reason why the Insecticons are special, despite not actually doing anything to demonstrate that they're any different form everyone else.

Having say the Predacons, dangerous actual characters who can interact hunting down the beleaguered Autobots, and actually picking them off one by one, would have actually given the Cybertron scenes some tension, rather than making us just wait for the inevitable rescue/escape and to see if maybe on or two characters die, even though there's no reason to think they would, and they didn't.

Infact the lack of deaths has been a major flaw all the way through. We've been told the Autobots were wiped out, but we've not seen a single one being killed by this supposed onslaught. Infact it’s pretty safe to assume that no one that has a toy is dead, which is basically all we were ever going to see anyway, so what was the point? All we really no is that Kups ship got shot down, but everyone was ok, and that Omega Supreme apparently had to deal with an army of cons, who were apparently incapable of even scuffing his paintjob. Some scenes of say the Hub being attacked, or some ships being shot down, or even just the aftermath of a battle with a couple of unidentifiable corpses would be have been something, but it may as well just not have happened.

i think the main thing that was kind of weird this issue was Tracks going "Sir? Are you scared?" although that could be a clue as to Prime's status.

I really think by this point it's safe to say it's not all just a trick, and that really is Optimus Prime. I mean he was fighting the swarm, and then got in Omega Supreme and ordered them all to Earth. If they have the real Prime stashed away on Cybertron still, then they just left him to get eaten while they're about to attack Megatron with a fake, which would be incredibly stupid of whoever was controlling it.

Unsurprisingly, it really was just bad writing all along.

I can't really work up the energy to care about this series anymore. It seems fairly obvious the last two issues will just be a giant fight scene, Autobots will show up, Decepticons will run off, and we'll be stuck in the status quo of the 1984 cartoon. The Autobots on Earth with the Decepticons getting ready to attack. Hoo-frickin-ray.

I'm getting really, really tired of McCarthy's tendency to drop hints without explaining anything. Okay, so Hunter apparently was the key to taking out the Autobot's defenses, because he's half organic half robot. Okay... so what? How the hell does that make sense? We get a conversation between Prime and Ironhide talking about the Matrix, but we still have no idea what the damn thing does or what it means! Heck, Megatron apparently was happy to grab it but hasn't made any plans (that we've seen) on how to use it or why it's important. We're supposed to buy that the Insecticons are special (so special it took a 1:1000 success rate to create them) but no description of the process or why it apparently made them super-intelligent (or why Kickback or Shrapnel are the same way, if they even are). All we've been given is that Bombshell is some sort of genius.

Starscream's "takeover" is a bit repetitive. We've seen it before. It was a lot more interesting in Infiltration when he did it because he felt that Megatron was weighing the Decepticon cause down (and everyone else backed him up!) I really liked the fact the two had seemed to get back on the same wavelength near the end of Devastation. Even given Screamer's comments earlier in AHM, it seemed more like he was trying to prod Megatron in the right direction without outright rebelling again. Megatron's plan doesn't make much sense... why purposely piss off Starscream? What purpose does that serve? Wouldn't it make more sense to keep everyone happy? I'm actually far more persuaded by Starscream, I think Megatron doesn't have a plan, and his claims he was just waiting for Starscream to "make his choice" is more grandstanding on Megatron's part. The Constructicons joining Starscream doesn't work because we've been given no view into their thought processes. The Constructicons are basically characterless slates here, it would've been a lot more interesting to see WHY they joined Megatron. Instead we've just been given the "LOOK DEVASTATOR FIGHTING MEGATRON ISN'T THAT COOL". Yay, we're back to the first Dreamwave mini!

The Swarm finally shows up in numbers more than 3 a page, and before they can really seem like a threat, it's Deus Ex Omega to save the day! Ugh.

The only thing giving me any interest is that I still think there might be an angle to the Prime story. Mainly because we haven't seen Ratchet at all since Prime came back online. (But I still think it's likely just bad writing)

So hey.

Soundwave sure got over the crushing grief of having that guy he was last seen with waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back in Megatron Origin die in his arms really quickly, didn't he?

Rumble shows up alive and well on page 8, between Starscream and Reflector.

So what was the point of killing him and having Soundwave cry out in sheer grief then?

Because it made for KEWL SCENE DEWD. This series reads like a movie trailer. All the mind-blowing shots that make you want to go see it, only in this case we're finding there ain't much more to it than what was in the trailer. It's like the major plot points got published and they forgot to write the rest of it in.

There was some whack dialogue going on in this issue as well. From the obligatory 'Tracks is a Pussy' question to Prime (would they ever actually ask their commander such a thing?), to the obtuse 'The Matrix...' and the random 'Mirage!' <--seriously I pored over that panel to see if I could see anything that would indicate that Ironhide suspected Mirage was there, and I don't see bupkiss. The mind boggles.

Also, the bridge thing. There's another small detail that hasn't been managed well. Issue 8 has Kup saying the bridge they're gonna blow is the only way into their bunker, they made sure of it. This leads to the climax of the issue with Sunstreaker's denouement, only to have another bridge materialize in Issue 10. If Shane had altered Kup's dialogue in Issue 8 to indicate that there was another bridge that the Swarm would eventually find their way around too, but for now we need to blow up this one, it wouldn't have seemed like an oversight when the new bridge appears in Issue 10. Also, if these Swarm are mutant Insecticons, why can't any of them fly?

Megatron's dialogue with the Space Bridge needs to be tweaked for clarification as well, instead of 'The first of many', 'The first of a new network' would have removed the confusion of 'Wait, that's not the first Space Bridge ever, oh hey he means a network'.

It's minor clarifications like this that trip this series up. A good writer will manage the small details as well as move the overall story along, and in the process of making sure all the t's are crossed and the i's dotted, will succeed in weaving a much tighter story. Shane is dropping the ball on some of these and so are the editors for not catching them. The only one he's done well on in this issue is the Omega hearing Hot Rod's message, as I'm sure most fans never thought about that message twice. Of course, he still comes in like a Deux ex machina to save the day and the Swarm, in the end, never have much impact at all.

You know when you think up a killer joke in your head, but then you say it, and everyone just looks at you like you've grown another head?


This series is that.


It's also crap.

I was facepalming during 9 because it looked like he died from a missile to the face, I thought even the cassettes would be tougher than that, and apparently they are.

That would be an interesting read.

Taken by itself, this was a very tolerable issue. The series is definitely hitting its stride and its shortcomings are getting ironed out. It's just a bit late in the game to really redeem it, and McCarthy still can't keep all of his plot threads active in a given issue. It's disappointing that the human subplot was nearly ignored most issues, and that the Hunter reveal wasn't given more time. Shane has a fair bit of trouble with telling, not showing.

I think Starscream alluded to the "more intellectual" members of the Decepticons joining his cause, didn't he? That was probably the clue for the Constructicons.



Maybe the colorist/s got their RIRFIB/RIBFIRs mixed up?



Oh, good, I was worried that I was the only one in the dark about what Ironhide and Prime were saying about it.

Ok, no, not really; I knew there would be others. I just hoped that someone might have picked up on something I hadn't.

--LBD "Nytetrayn"

I was upset to read that yes, indeed the Autobots on Cybertron are the only Autobots in the galaxy ever now

What?

A galaxy wide, highly decentralized, well armed army who just happened to get their mitts on an intel device pretty much anyone would kill for, and with recent work giving them a stable version of apocalypse level tech, doesn't just get beat, but is nearly wiped out?

And is reduced to one planet when reasonably they'd still be spread out halfway around the galaxy?

What?

Unless we're told otherwise, I see no reason to believe that the other 'Bot forces were wiped out. Some of 'em are probably dead, but I expect the vast majority are either in hiding or held captive.

With luck, the ongoing will outright state such.

It's more likely Autobot resources have been wiped out. Bases, outposts, equipment and ammunition stockpiles, energon. Without which waging a war on any scale would be nearly impossible.

Hey maybe they'll find some Nucleon?

SP

Or, given the end of Revelations, and how Jetfire is alive and discussing events post AHM (so we know at least he survives) there's always Gorlam Prime, which is now home to a massive population of Jhiaxus' artificaily evolved Micromasters. That's enough new recruits and potential resources to rebuild the Autobots army right there alone.

And that's not even counting Jetfire himself, who, if the 'Ation series has taught us anything, makes everything ok just by being so damned awesome.

Speaking of which, Omega Supreme showing up was great and all but you know who would've been even more awesome hearing Hot Rod's message?

Countdown.

I'd have forgiven all of AHM on that basis alone.

You know, that's just crazy enough to work.

Even better if we get the same "They would send an army to take you down" exchange.

Because Countdown could totally take down an army.

But he's a stupid generation 2 character!
And stupid generation 2 characters only appear in AHM to die!

Countdown was second on my list of better characters than Omega to have come to the rescue, just infront of Sky Lynx, and behind Jetfire and the Technobots/Computron. Using Universe Countdown for his design would have been nice too, since the whole Gorlam Prime thing would prevent him being a Micromaster.

Ah well, at least we have Omega Supreme mysteriously suddenly not being ridiculously outclassed by a gestalt to look forward to instead!

Prowl's "We were told all of the outposts had been annihlated. That no Autobots had survived." isn't enough for you? Certainly makes it sound like most of them are dead. Sure, there's the possibility for some to be alive out there (given Kup's suggestion of searching for survivors), but Omega's "not all" seems more that he's pointing out he survived, not neccessarily others. And even if there are a few out there, it will need to be limited... sounds a lot like Marvel's lowering all the mutants to 198, all it does is limit the possibilities.

No, he is G1

I reckon Sky Lynx should have swooped down to rescue them

And all the Autobots would have been all "...uh no it's okay Sky Lynx, we're fine here, go away..."

It's a joke.

Prowl is, at this point, an unreliable source on this. He's been on a world under a communications blackout, and the last sitrep he got may as well have been Decepticon propaganda. Kup may have filled him in a bit further, but even Kup got blindsided when the Trion was shot down so I'm guessing he wouldn't have been aware of every last Autobot being gunned down like a dog.

It's far from authoritative.

How did he even hear about it to begin with? Everything was lah-dee-dah status quo before Megatron's ambush, and then they get shoved to Cybertron... so how'd they hear about everything else being wiped out to begin with? They damn well couldn't pick up Hot Rod's message, how could they even do longer range things?

Sense. This comic keeps making none.

Greetings!

I am new to this forum but not to Transformers and I have been enjoying All Hail Megatron. I have put my thoughts in writing for all to see but got a bit carried away! Hopefully I can convince you of the error of your ways.



All Hail Megatron is easily the greatest thing to come from IDW publishing, nay any of the big comic publishers in the past few years. Whilst DC and Marvel have tried - and failed - to capture reader interest with sprawling, ugly events, IDW have effortlessly published a tome that I feel will still be held in high regard in years to come.

The premise of All Hail Megatron is deceptively simple - the Decepticons have conquered the planet Earth and are now at a loose end, whilst the Autobots are trapped on Cybertron and unable to interact with their foes. This is the statue quo for 10 of the 12 issues of the series and creates a tense atmosphere as these two sides both deal with the boredom and ennui that their lives have become.

It was designed as a 'soft reboot', a jumping on point for new readers, and it does this job admirably. The writer Shane McCarthy, fresh from the success of redeveloping DC's The Riddler as a metrosexual gangster (a change sadly not kept on by any of the subsequent writers) carefully crafted the series so that swathes of continuity could be ignored, freeing the new reader from needing to have read the past comics since they no longer mattered or happened as we read them. Of course, there were still delicious nuggets for longer term readers to enjoy, such as the previous series being integral to understanding the motivations of several characters; and the shocking revelation that Cybertron was indeed still a radioactive wasteland, the Autobots having hidden from the reader the incredible pain being on their homeworld caused to their bodies from the radiation for six issues. The new reader would have some exciting holes in the narrative to delightfully puzzle over, and the experienced reader would have the joy of guessing which parts of IDW's previous Transformer comics were still canonical.

A good industry comparison would be to the X-Men comics. Grant Morrison's run on X-Men, like Simon Furman's on Transformers, is often thought of as well-regarded by fans. But such a scope of original and new ideas can become wearing on the readership, and like Marvel before them, IDW realised this. Most readers do not seek anything new, instead they wish to recapture their childhood and need the nostalgia. Dreamwave successfully captured this under the guiding hand of Pat Lee, and it is this triumphant return to the old tropes that makes AHM so successful. Chuck Austin took over from Grant Morrison directly on the X-Men comic, and set about returning the book to its classic setup, removing many of the new ideas Morrison had inserted and instead replacing them with the same tried-and-trusted stories that had made the franchise so successful. Like Austin before him, McCarthy looked at what the IDW canon had become, and removed the story and character aspects that were not part of the 'nostalgic' pure view of Transformers, crystallising what made the original cartoon so good and ensuring that the franchise does not move forward and erroneously develop from this point of perfection.

It also strikes me to be similar to Jeph Loeb's blockbuster work on Marvel's Ultimates line. He took a line that had strayed too far from its roots, returning it to the 'classic' Marvel feel and removing the unwelcome additional ideas and development added to the characters and settings. In this way, the pleasant, nostalgic glow of reading something familiar is returned to the reader.

One thing in particular that AHM did fantastically well was the Swarm, which menaced the Autobots during their stay on Cybertron. Like the classic hordes of zombies upon which they were based, the Swarm was said to number 3000 deadly beasts, all on the look-out to kill our heroes. Lesser writers may have tried to play up this danger, or show the reader how terrifying the swarm was. To its credit, AHM does not stray down this path. Instead the menace of the Swarm is conveyed not by what they do, but what they don't do. We hardly ever see more than a few on panel at a time. When they do appear they are killed swiftly and easily, and they never harm any of the main characters or place them in any danger.

But they might have!

It has been said that the scariest thing is not what the eye sees, but what it doesn't see, and All Hail Megatron is a feast for the non-seeing eye. The Swarm are terrifying and dangerous because we never see them be terrifying and dangerous. But they could be! Just as off-camera violence can be scarier than on-screen gore fests, so the swarm's terror is conveyed by the lack of terror they outwardly present. We don't know what they are capable of because they never show us, which makes the mind race with myriad possibilities.

How can you speak of the swarm without speaking of Sunstreaker of course? The Swarm never killed anyone (but they could have!) but Sunstreaker chose to sacrifice himself bravely by blowing up a bridge. It does not matter that there was a second bridge the reader did not know about, or that the idea of placing a detonator and then shooting it with one special gun was flawed. In fact I would argue that it makes Sunstreaker's death the more poignant. His noble sacrifice was reduced to a meaningless death, which suits the terror and chaos that is war.

Sunstreaker's motivation was also one of the most fascinating things about this maxi-series. For most of the issues he is simply /there/ glimpsed in the background, just another soldier. He is so mysterious and enthralling that he does not get any dialogue or attention drawn to him at all until the issue before he is revealed as the big traitor. "Who is this mech?" we thought, "what is his story?". Then he gets one page to talk about not having a head and reveals that he is the traitor and kills himself. For those new to the series using AHM as its intended jumping on point, there is only one solution - he is insane and evil. Discovering such a well loved Autobot was in fact insane and evil was hard on many fans, but again the very randomness of this reflects the randomness that is war.

Of course, for those of us who were long term readers, we get an even deeper look into Sunstreaker. We know what he has gone through, we know of his adventures with the humans and the friendship he shared with some of them - who would have known that this friendship hid a murderous sociopathic rage which had him begging Starscream to commit genocide on every single human being! Even the careful reader would not have been able to see this amazing twist coming until it was there!

The arrival of Omega Supreme was another fantastic addition, a literal deus ex machina. The gods themselves had deemed that the action needed to move off Cybertron, and so Omega appeared out of thin air, picking up a signal that we were told was impossible to have left Cybertron. In a particularly brilliant twist, Omega Supreme last appeared in the IDW comics around 3 times larger than Prime. Here he is the size of a city, and crushes an army beneath his feet. This was certainly a twist no-one saw coming, and Prime gets to demonstrate his unflappable cool by simply bidding welcome and then climbing inside the now gigantic body of his friend to fly off to Earth.

Drift is another welcome addition to the franchise, a brand-new character crafted by McCarthy himself and publicised as 'IDW's Wolverine'. He is a member of the elite Autobot Wreckers and one of the last Autobots surviving. He even garnered himself a one-shot comic before he'd even appeared in print, a sure sign of the character's enduring popularity. In many ways, Drift's unflappable ninja cool, his invincible persona and his dark, edgy bad-ass past edge him above the more mundane Autobots. His friends are constantly asking about where he is when he isn't on panel, reaffirming what a popular and well-liked character he is. In many ways, he is the IDW equivalent of Forerunner from the Countdown comics - a new character who can easily best the most established of fan-favourites, fighting with consummate honour and ninja skill. The roots of the Transformers story lies firmly in Japan, so it is fitting that Drift, the greatest of the Autobots, be Japanese, with skill, honour, and his giant sword which he may only draw in the most dire of circumstances. He deserves to be IDW's Wolverine, and I hope to see further spinoffs to examine his mysterious ninja past some more.

Starscream also comes across fantastically in this series. By the publication of All Hail Megatron, there had been three major Transformers series published by IDW, two of them revolving around Starscream betraying Megatron. Bravely McCarthy does the unexpected and focuses his story on Starscream betraying Megatron. Starscream betraying Megatron again is so obvious that it becomes unlikely and is thus unexpected when it happens and we, the reader, are left to revel in shock at the surprise.

Megatron's plan which sets the whole events in motion is sheer tactical genius, as promised by the solicitations. Some have accused his master plan - of tricking all 20 Autobots on Earth to walk into the desert without any backup and then shoot them, thus winning the war across the galaxy - to be simplistic. Not so. His genius has somehow forced the Autobots into making stupid mistake after stupid mistake, especially since previous IDW series showed the Autobots to come into the posession of the Magnificence, an object of supreme tactical use. Megatron's deceptively straightforward plan makes the Autobots act like simple fools and so be defeated.

A series entitled All Hail Megatron may fall into the trap of featuring the titular character. Not so - McCarthy realises that in order to build up the character of Megatron, he must be featured as little as possible. In several issues Megatron doesn't appear, and when he does there are only the smallest snippets of any characterisation. This builds up suspense for the reader - who is Megatron? What is he planning? What does he do? Thus when Starscream eventually unexpectedly betrays his leader, we, the reader, are left rooting for Megatron, wanting him to survive so we can learn more of this intriguing enigma.

McCarthy's powerful writing style is able to juggle a wealth of plot threads, leaving many of them tantalisingly unmentioned for issues at a time. We first learn the Autobots were defeated by the Decepticons and left on Cybertron on issue 1, but it is only by issue 7 that the mystery is finally solved, and Jazz informs us in a lengthy flashback that the Autobots were indeed defeated by the Decepticons and left on Cybertron. The human story is cunningly weaved into the narrative too, with many characters developed in the first few issues, but then vanishing, some to return around six issues later cunningly flitting back into the narrative.

Spike in himself is a well rounded character. He literally vanishes from the narrative in the early issues, sneaking back into the field in issue 9. As the reader forgot all about him, so did the Decepticons! Some exciting experimental meta-narrative there. And who could have failed to warm to him as he swaggered back into view, naked chest bared as he sewed his trousers closed and proceeded to sexily flirt with the female characters, before infiltrating a military establishment with such ease that it didn't even need to be shown on panel! Spike is also shown to be a fallible character, ignoring his special Transformer-killing weapon in lieu of a normal handgun and thus is defeated by the cassette Rumble. It is only though the actions of an angry black man with a rocket launcher that the Decepticon is felled. The message here is simple - the entire army of the world could not damage a single Decepticon, but the love of a father for his dead son gives one man the power to defeat them. As he so touchingly put it "this is for my son you bastard!"

McCarthy's distaste for the UN shows through clearly, in what is one of the books main political strokes. The Decepticons are shown to have destroyed a huge chunk of the planet, from America to Israel to Bejing. However the UN believes that by nuking New York, the Decepticons can be defeated. As readers we have seen the Decepticons effortlessly spreading across the globe and so the uselessness of the UN's resolution is laid bare - it is not the Decepticons they wish to attack, but America itself, using the invasion as a cover for their own insane desire to nuke New York!

This revelation is the cliffhanger to issue 6, but in a stroke of genius the exact same resolution is also the cliffhanger to issue 9. The aim is simple - to paint the UN as an inefficient, slow organisation. With the world in the grip of giant killer space robots they have not enacted a decision made in three issues, instead parroting the same lines again and again. Of course, when the attack does come, it is not with nuclear weapons but with an airstrike in the form of Eurofighters. Eurofighters are not nuclear bombers or missile batteries, especially when we have seen how easily the Decepticons destroy an air force - it demonstrates the complete ineptness of the UN and its political processes in a cunning satire.

As a whole then, All Hail Megatron deserves its reputation. The tale is crafted so that the reader empathises with the Autobots - we feel frustration along with them at their banishment to Cybertron and being locked out of the action. We feel confusion as to what is going on, as the Autobots do. We even feel for the Decepticons who aimlessly wander about Earth. Thankfully IDW have announced a sequel in the form of AHM: Coda, and that McCarthy will continue to lead the brand as head writer. The future looks certain.

It took me about two paragraphs to realise this may be the best post ever in the history of anything!

Despite not agreeing with some of those points, I can't argue with how entertaining that post was.

If this was Penny Arcade, I'd report it for awesome.

Yeah... I was all ready to start my eye-rolling when... as I realized what I was reading... I did a spit-take of coffee all over my monitor. A stealthy post indeed.

Bravo, Karnak. Your wonderful post has converted me!