..the ends will consume the means. How a thing is done becomes the thing itself.
Keep reading for a review of Transformers #23.
We start with a meeting of the Senate, which has deliberately excluded the Ascenticons, because it’s so painfully obvious that they’re responsible for all the violence. Problem is, there’s no proof, so Megatron is free to be righteously indignant, claiming that they’re being unfairly blamed for everything.
And of course you’ve got the usual rumormongers saying things like “Well I heard it was (*insane out of left field unproven idea*) and I’m not saying that’s what it IS, but it could be that” and next thing you know that idea’s all over whatever the Transformer equivalent of Facebook is. Of course, if you try to shut down that kind of “inflammatory scrap” then you’re not giving an equal voice to everybody because GOD FORBID we not put the crazy people on the evening news and I’M SORRY I’LL GET OFF MY SOAPBOX NOW.
You can tell Ironhide’s losing patience with Orion: with every new disaster Orion just blames himself more and more and now he’s just wallowing in it. But the Autobots keep ending up behind the eight ball, they never can predict exactly how bad the situation can get.
Megatron points out the years of energon rationing, the lack of expansion, basically the stagnation of everything, and all for what? The Tether falls and kills thousands, and they’ve lost the energon collecting moon, so now there’ll be MORE rationing and curfews and arrests and it’s obviously the fault of the useless Senate!
Never mind the fact that it’s totally the fault of the Ascenticons; even if someone presented the people with iron-clad proof that Megatron did it, nobody would believe it, everyone’s too angry and they’re willing to follow the person with even a tissue-paper promise that he can make things better.
Megatron’s not admitting the Tether thing, but he is totally fine with pushing for violence.
…if you make measured change impossible, you make chaotic change inevitable.
He really does believe that anything is better than keeping things the way they were. No one was going to listen to him if he played by the rules, so he had to keep ramping things up higher and higher. It’s all been written very well, this whole journey, to explain why Megatron isn’t a cartoonish “Mwah ha ha” villain who does things because they’re eeeeeviilll. He’s doing everything because he feels like he had no choice.
Of course, his plan to make the Rise the bad guys so the Ascenticons could be the good guys? I still think that was stupid, and it blew up in his face.
He’s already said to his closest followers that, now that there’s been so much death, they have to keep moving forward, because the alternative is prison. It’s all or nothing. I wonder if that’s what the inside of his head looks like too. He’s a mass murderer now, if his plans to change Cybertron totally fail, he’ll have to come to terms with that.
But it really is annoying how mystified the Autobots are when things get violent. Every time, they just can’t get a clue.
We also get a little more behind the decision to use the name “Decepticons” this issue, and I don’t want to spoil that, but I feel like it’s a little bit of a reach? Not the fault of the writing, though, that name was always going to be tough to explain. I love how in the Bumblebee movie someone pointed out “…uh, should we trust them? They call themselves Decepticons.” If you’re trying to give your bad guys some depth, make them believe in their own cause, then the reasoning behind taking a name like that will be pretty convoluted and unwieldy, I think the author’s done they best they can.
I always enjoy Anna Malkova’s art, especially how she draws Prowl and Orion, and Starscream looks great as he smarms all over Bumblebee’s cell. But my favorite bit of art this issue was Joana Lafuente’s cover: Megatron looks amazing, he’s got this quietly powerful pose, and the colors and shading are excellent, I just love it.
