We knew it was going to happen eventually, just maybe not so soon: remember Sentinel’s army of Titans that got lost in deep space while on their way to destroy Cybertron? Well, they’re here. Now.
Click the jump for preview pages and spoiler-free review of Transformers: Till All Are One #5.
The story
This book went back to doing everything I love: Transformers dealing with Transformer problems. No humans, no Micronauts, no Dire Wraiths or Space Knights, just giant robots blasting away at the enemy and dropping clever quips in the breaks. I love this stuff.
Almost everybody acts the way you’d expect them to: Iron Hide leads the troops into battle, Windblade shows why you want to keep a Cityspeaker nearby, and the Cybertronians in the face of a really big army of really really really big monsters (yes they’re Titans, but some of their faces are falling off…they’re undead Titans, which is deliciously creepy) stand tough and defend the planet.
Two people surprised me, though I won’t say why: Starscream had a couple moments where I wondered if our favorite, whiny, second-in-command-trying-desperately-to-be-a-supreme-leader had been brainwashed or something. In a good way, mind you.
And then Elita had a moment that surprised me, but probably shouldn’t have: I forget sometimes that this is not the Elita you might remember from the G1 cartoons. This one is way more of a survivor.
(The look on Starscream’s face was pretty funny, though.)
The art
Once again, the team of Sara Pitre-Durocher and Joana Lafuente knocked it out of the park, and it’s so so pretty to watch. Not only are the faces and expressions amazing, but there are so many panels where everyone is just arranged perfectly: excellent framing, excellent perspective, the works. There’s one page in Razorbeast’s ship with Starscream on the monitor in the background and an arm and hand in the foreground resting on the back of the chair, and the details are all just perfect. You can really tell how much time goes into the art, not just in the drawing and coloring but in the planning of each scene. I could go on and on. I have gone on and on, but I can’t help it.
(Also I loved the main cover: not only is it beautiful to look at, but for the first time in a while I really felt like Metroplex was a character, instead of a disembodied voice. His expression as he looks up at what’s coming is excellent.)
If you haven’t been reading this series, you need to go take a look. This isn’t even a milestone issue or the end of an arc, this is just a mid-run issue being awesome.
