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Click the jump for a review of IDW’s More Than Meets The Eye #44!
It was a pretty introspective issue this month, but for anybody worried that it might be too introspective, it’s balanced out with Hot Rod being a goofball, Chromedome and Rewind being sweet, and Swerve being…well, Swerve.
Once again James Roberts drops a little more knowledge (“dripfeeds history” as it’s been called) about Cybertronians. One thing we may have heard before but I hadn’t really considered until now: the Transformer race is currently finite. There aren’t any new sparks being made. So every one that dies brings them a step closer to extinction. It’s no wonder that this whole issue dealt with what comes after a spark goes out, if anything.
Meanwhile we’re also reminded that Rewind joined this quest so he could find out what happened to his previous Conjunx Endura. Chromedome is supportive of this, but you know it can’t be easy helping your soul mate find their previous soul mate.
The end of the story is downright chilling, especially when you find out what’s up with the flowers.
(EDITED TO ADD: Arrgh, amateur mistake! I grabbed the credit info from the press release, not the credit page, Alex Milne didn’t do the art this issue, it’s Hayato Sakamoto, who did a lovely job. And that answers my question below about the noses. Thank you to the commenters who corrected me! Mea culpa!)
The art is, as always, fantastic. There’s always an interaction going on in the background of every panel that makes you linger over every page. And it’s been said before, but he’s amazing with characters like Chromedome and Rewind and anyone else with a full faceplate: he can still depict expression and emotion without a mouth or separate eyes, that’s pretty impressive.
I do have one quibble: what’s happening with Hot Rod’s nose? It’s been small before, but now it’s on the point of disappearing altogether, Transformers Prime style. Not that there’s anything wrong with Transformers Prime, but I’m partial to noses on my bots.
What do you think? Shout out in the comments!
James Roberts – writer
Hayato Sakamoto – art