If you’re looking for one of those sappy, cheesy, awkward holiday specials, this is not that book. If you’re looking for serious, gut-wrenching, intense drama…this is also not that book.
The Transformers Holiday Special is ridiculously fun. It pokes fun at itself and any other holiday trope it can reach, but the writing and artwork are some of IDW’s best (not surprising considering who wrote and drew it.) Click the jump for preview pages and a review!
The issue features three stories by three different teams. We start out with “Choose Me,” written by Mairghread Scott, art by Corin Howell, and colors by Thomas Deer. Scott and Howell worked together on Windblade, and we see the same light-hearted fun here.
If you’d told me someone could pair up The Night Before Christmas, The Grinch Stole Christmas, and Starscream…I would’ve wondered why no one’s thought of it before. It’s perfect. And it rhymes!
The artwork is fantastic, both because the expressions are endlessly hysterical, and because you can watch as Starscream just loses it. The crazy gleam in his eyes gets me every time. (Also the Grinch grin, because as I said before: perfect.)
Next up is “Silent Light,” written by James Roberts, with artwork by Kotteri and colors by Joanna Lafuente. The writing is, unsurprisingly, amazing (Roberts’ More Than Meets The Eye series is my current favorite of the Transformers titles) and subtly hilarious. (“A contrivance engine.” Hee hee hee!)
It’s matched perfectly by Kotteri’s art: the expressions are just exaggerated enough to be funny (Rodimus’ expression when he says “You know I hate hats” is one of my favorites) but the style is still beautifully G1, with a slight manga quality. It’s really pretty to look at.
Last but not least is “The Thirteenth Day of Christmas” by John Barber, with art by Josh Burcham. It is, I’m not kidding you, a film noir holiday murder mystery as written by the world’s most awful and endearing author of human-style fiction: Thundercracker. It’s glorious.
I sometimes skip reading the main Transformers book, just because there’s a few too many humans running around. But I really liked how Burcham drew the human characters in this story, and I wouldn’t mind seeing a lot more of his work.
The writing in this one was equally good. Barber has really nailed Thundercracker’s style: it’s equal parts a cultural barrier minefield, and bad fanfiction. I would buy everything Thundercracker ever wrote.
Preview images and description courtesy of IDW.