The Dying of the Light part 4! Twilight’s last gleaming! The end is nigh. No chance of escape. No last-minute reprieve. But nothing loosens the tongue like imminent death, and the crew of the Lost Light use their final hours to say what—until now—was unsayable.
Is this the end? No, this isn’t the end. Not YET anyway. (Maybe.) Click the jump for a spoiler-free review and preview pages of IDW’s Transformers: More Than Meets the Eye #53!
I try to stay way the hell away from seeing any spoilers when it comes to MTMTE, so it’s my own fault that I keep thinking each issue is the last one in this arc, and I’m constantly wrong. By the end of this issue there’s still more of the story to come, but holy cow did we get a lot of other information dropped on us. I had to double check: it’s a regular-sized issue. With everything we learned I could’ve sworn it was bigger.
Megatron has taken his stance of non-violence, and he’s not budging, no matter what. We finally get to see how Rodimus reacts to this. I’ve gotta say, I’m not surprised. It seems perfectly true to his character. Look, I like Roddy, don’t get me wrong, but his treatment of Megatron seemed almost immature. However, I also see his point: Megatron was the scourge of the Autobots for literally millions of years. Now he’s on the Autobots’ side, and it’s not going to help them one single bit. That’d be enough to make me get a little whiny too.
However, he also got what was coming to him regarding the Chromedome situation. Rewind was totally right. About everything actually. I didn’t have a single problem with any of Rewind’s actions, especially since he was in an impossible situation.
The information Chromedome found out was certainly unexpected. (To me, anyway. Did any of you see that coming?) I’d be very interested to know if James Roberts had that planned out from the very beginning. I don’t think I saw that reveal telegraphed anywhere.
I also didn’t realize what Nautica had planned. It makes sense though: they all believe this is their last few hours alive, though I hope they’re wrong about that. I think we’ve got a few too many major characters here to have them all die, but I could get my heart ripped out next issue.
Whether or not they survive, that was a really sweet moment. A teeny bit cheesy maybe, but only in a sincere way that makes you smile.
Cyclonus, in contrast, is never cheesy. But the information he dropped was amazingly powerful, and it’s something the book’s been building up to for a while now. When I think back to the Cyclonus we knew 52 issues ago, I would’ve never guessed he’d be like this now. But I approve of all of it.
I’m worried about Skids, though. I don’t think he can handle the memories he’s dealing with now, and I think he’s getting worse.
I do like Ambus’ new duds though.
As for the art, it was a really nice combination of Alex Milne and Hayato Sakamoto. With Joana Lafuente’s colors I missed where the transition happened, but Hayato’s expressions are very recognizable (and awesome) when someone’s frustrated (like Roddy’s face when he realizes the downside to an impenetrable forcefield.)
And no, I don’t know if next issue is going to be the final one in the arc. I’m kind of hoping it isn’t, since I’m really enjoying it (and I really don’t want to lose anybody, and I really think we will.) But I’m also kind of hoping next issue is the last one. Because the suspense is killing me!
Preview pages and intro courtesy of IDW.