And just like that, we became something so much bigger than ourselves.
Keep reading for a review of Transformers: Galaxies #1.
(Some spoilers below, you might want to shelve this review until after you’ve read the issue.)
I’m going to say right off the bat that I’m a big fan of Livio Ramondelli’s work, and I thought the art in this issue was excellent. I love the textured look he gives to the Transformers; it ages them, giving you an idea of what metal would look like on something that lives for millions of years. I love the bright points of their eyes, the way it makes the metal on their face glow, and how it looks especially creepy in the dark. The expressions tend to be understated (except when they’re smiling or yelling) but I like his faces too. (Especially the smiles.) He’s got his work cut out for him, expression-wise, since Wheeljack and three of the Constructicons have faceplates instead of mouths, but I think he does a good job of suggesting emotion with poses, turns of the head, or subtle changes in the shape of the eyes.
He does a great job with backgrounds too, and I’d love to see a poster-sized version of the newly-built Crystal City, that was lovely.
Between the cartoons and the comics, the Constructions have always had inconsistent origin stories. Even if you concentrate on the G1 cartoon, either Megatron built them on Earth as Deceptions from the get-go, or they built him, or they were built on Cybertron and were originally Autobots (or at least unaligned) and brainwashed into being Deceptions later, depending on which episode you’re looking at.
In our interview with him, Tyler Bleszinski said the idea of them being brainwashed always bugged him, because it took away any choice they had. He also likes villains that have some depth to their backstory. This explains why the idea of choice, and informed choice, is so strongly reinforced in this issue. The decision to use the Enigma of Combination was their own choice, but Termagax didn’t tell them until after they’d gone past the point of no return that an earlier combiner had gone crazy and destroyed part of Cybertron.
It might’ve been nice if you’d chosen to tell us this tale of madness earlier.
When Wheeljack and the Constructicons call her on that, she doubles down: if they knew that story, she says, they might not have chosen to combine. This pretty much tells you everything you need to know about Termagax: she takes risks and withholds information if it’s convenient, because she obviously knows best.
Wheeljack’s character is interesting in this new continuity: he’s brilliant, and outwardly resentful of anyone second guessing him, which is a switch from the more cheerful version in the G1 cartoons. He’s also reluctant to take risks, as opposed to the G1 Wheeljack who seemed to embrace the mad scientist role.
It’s no surprise that Bombshell showed up at the end: he’s had a long history in the comics of messing with the Constructions, up to and including taking over Prowl’s brain to make him be the new head of Devastator for a while, so I’m curious to see what his plans are this time around.
Fans of Devastator will probably find lots of Easter Eggs hidden in the issue. When Devastator first forms (though they don’t call him that yet, that name comes later) you can see both his eyes, but when all the Constructicons learn how to truly merge together, the eyes blaze up into a single visor. That’s a pretty neat way to retcon the reason for him having two eyes in the G1 cartoon “Heavy Metal War”, but a visor in “The Master Builders.”
One subtle bit jumped out at me: when the Constructicons are deciding whether or not to merge, one of them says “I’d rather not have to share anything with you bores…” The panel was focused on the torso, which is Hook’s part of the gestalt (in the G1 cartoon I mean, we are not going to get into Revenge of the Fallen) and not only is he the most snobbish one on the team, he’s also the one in the 1986 movie who yelled at Soundwave “No one would follow an uncharismatic bore like you!” I appreciate that attention to detail.
We’re left with some questions by the end of the issue: it seems like the Constructions have been exiled because of something they did as Devastator, but we haven’t been told what that was. Exactly how bad did things get? Also, Termagax still has a leadership position in this issue, as opposed to being a recluse in the main Transformers book. Does her decision to convince the Constructions to become a Combiner have anything to do with that?
All in all, this issue was a straightforward introduction to each of the Constructions: their names, their personalities, and how they combined for the first time. I’m hoping next issue is when we find out how they got kicked off of Cybertron, and what they’re prepared to do about it.