So, in the interval between parts of this article, I’ve overcome illness, unemployment, and gorged myself on chocolate eggs to celebrate zombie jesus time. Now all that’s out the way, it’s time to get back onto writing well-informed, slightly mocking articles about robots.
In the first part of this article, I explored the history of the Transformers franchise in it’s various animated incarnations. I showed you the different cartoons, and explained a little about the history and story of each, and gave a brief introduction.
Of course, the cartoons are only one part of the fictional exploits of the robots in disguise from another world. Way before the first episode of the series debuted, there were Transformers comics – and they’ve been going as long as there’ve been toys.
Things started way back in the 80′s when everything awful great nostalgic was made, with a 4-issue limited series by a little comic book company called Marvel Comics
To begin with, the series was pitched as a limited series, as a tie-in with the toyline – as was common back in those days. Everything had comics released to promote it, and Transformers was no different.
The story was simple, and the art and writing was, quite frankly, terrible in the first 4 issues – but it was good enough to keep that 4-issue limited series going into a monthly series.
The art got better, the stories got more exciting, and the series took off – big time.
As things moved onward, the plots grew in complexity and depth, introducing new characters, making stars and fan-favourites of obscure ones, and diverging completely and forging it’s own world and continuity completely separate from that of the cartoon.
Double-crosses and alliances were made, rivalries forged, and epic legends, mythologies and histories came to be over the years of the comics’ publication.
So successful was the US Marvel series that a UK one was published seperate,
extending to a stunning 331 issues in length -although that’s kind of cheating, since some of the page count was filled up with reprints of the US stories. The US Comic, as a monthly, also lasted for a long while, stretching to issue 80.
Many writers cut their teeth doing transformers comics, and many of the UK comics’ artists were regulars from 2000AD. Of particular note is Simon Furman, who has now become the lifeblood of Transformers fiction, and has written for episodes of Beast Wars, and to this date is still writing transformers comics.
He’s also become known for his Furmanisms, which are hilarious.
While the stories were, overall and for the most part, weaving an amazing tapestry that ends in a most magnificent and spectacular ending, there are still some things that are, without a doubt fucking stupid. Some of the stories veer into outright rediculousness, that even the writers must have realised – such stories as ‘Buster Witwicky and The Carwash of Doom’, which is exactly what it sounds like, and things like Micromaster transformer wrestling
leagues – a result of the popularity of WWF wrestling in the late 80′s.
Many of the stories were also subject to the whims of Hasbro, as the toys were of course still being produced at the time of the comic being published – so frequently the cast would change wildly, and some characters would be forgotten about or killed off, often in rediculous ways. Such as gigantic powerhouse behemoth Omega Supreme being knocked out in one shot from tape-transformer Buzzsaw.
This aside, the comic lasted a long, long time, and is still fondly remembered today by old farts like me, and reprints and collections have been made and fly off the bookshelves with alarming regularity. Modern day publishers of the Transformers comics have also begun reprints of the individual issues, which have steady sales, and many of the original artists and writers still enjoy success in the industry – and there’s still yet to be a single publisher of Transformers comics that lasts as long as Marvel managed.
Things moved on, of course, and the regular series came to an end, going out on a titanic battle with – who else – but the planet-eating Orson Welles voiced robotic-god-of-evil, Unicron, for the fate of their entire race and the universe.
Awesomely illustrated by top artist Andrew Wildman, the series came to a breathless close, and it was over — Finished!
Of course – it never ends, and only a few short years later, as the toyline was released in brighter coloured, newly molded versions as the 90′s neon-and-gimmick inspired ‘Generation 2′, so too the comics burst back into being, vomited forth with ugly artwork, but a decent story penned, again, but Simon Furman, for another trip around the universe, and another chance to save it.
Once again, all was at stake, and it had to do with the history of their own race. New ideas were revealed, and the dark (and pulled out from Furman’s arse) history of the Transformers, completely different, yet still related, to their other dark history chomping on Cybertron in the picture above, has come back to haunt them, and everyone else.
New enemies have arrived also – the Decepticon Empire, a ruthless race of 
highly advanced transformers from somewhere at the edge of the Galaxy, and they make the Decepticons of the comics look like the Decepticons of the animated series – incompetent jackass losers, and comedy relief at the worst.
In keeping with the 90′s trend of comic psychopaths Anti-heroes, the Autobots were ‘grittier’ and more ‘edgy’ which just ended up being a bit dumb and didn’t really work, since Furman hadn’t really got that pinned down at the time. The art was also sadly missing Andrew Wildman, Geoff Senior, or anyone who was actually good, and all the transformers looked horrifyingly bad, until the last few issues, where someone managed to surreptitiously sneak a few pages of Andrew Wildman’s art in.
No really – a few random pages. Not a whole issue. Then the art went back to someone elses’ style.
Anyhow, the series ended on a setup for a sequel that was never published in any official capacity, and was instead continued in a fan-related publication written by Furman years later. And so, Generation 2 was surplus to requirements, and faded away for years to come.
But like some vast predatory bird, the spectre of Transformers comics continued to hover, as the franchise did itself. All remained quiet for years, until, with no warning, in 2001, a new company exploded to life from
nowhere.
There was a tremendous buzz as the preview issues of the comics were released. The art was sophisticated and bright, with glorious colours. The comics themselves were of high quality printing, and the writing had a slightly sinister edge to it, which was welcome – after all, Dreamwave knew that their audience would now be twenty-something young adults who grew up with transformers, and wanted stories with complex ideas and conflicts.
Everything was welcome, exciting, and glorious for the new comic series. Fans bought up the comics like the proverbial hot-cakes, so much so that reprints were needed just to keep the comics on the shelves. No one could get enough of their stuff – but then the bad news came.
Issues started being published late, deadlines came and went with no sign of comics – which was due to the books not being correctly licenced for distribution outside of the US. More trouble followed as soon as this was sorted out, as news of creators not getting paid came to the fore, and of a forced ‘house style’ or artwork also came to light.
Artists were, quite obviously, not happy about this, as it made some of their art look like Pat Lee’s, which was far from the best art in use at Dreamwave.
Dreamwave were forced to reap the whirlwind when their bankruptcy was declared, their debts in excess of 1 million dollars at the time of the company’s collapse. Pat Lee had been ‘forgetting’ to pay the creators, artists, writers, and probably the cleaning lady, and as such nobody wanted to work for him. He secretly moved all the companies’ assets – including his company car, which was a fucking porsche. Proving there is some justice in the world, this company also went bust, but sadly Pat Lee is still at large.
Dreamwave, and especially Pat ‘Superstar artist’ Lee, as he was termed in the companies’ literature, and not Pat ‘I’m a dickhole’ Lee, as he should have been, were put out of mind by Transformers fans with a bitterness and slight taste of excrement, before something new happened – this time, a lot quicker than the six year gap between Marvel and Dreamwave.
All across the world, new comic covers began appearing with art so good it made grown men (and a few geeky women) cry in joy. No marshmallow-bulgy-rounded robots were on show. Clean artwork, with rigid lines, updated and more complex robot designs, and familar, old-school characters were on display. But who was this mysterious company? What were they going to do?
All was soon revealed as a new Generation 1 transformers comic arrived on shelves, published by a company called IDW, known only before for their range of horror comics and tie-ins, before they made a stand, and saved the transformers licence from Dreamwave’s festering clutches.
The new company had salvaged most of the creative talent from Dreamwave too, employing artists such as Don Figueroa, and writer Simon Furman (who by this point, might as well have an Autobot symbol stamped on his forehead), and struck out with new artists as well, making a huge impact from moment one.
Rather than follow any existing or accepted story, they started from scratch, keeping only the basics of the transformers continuity, and starting a new, more complex and more shadowy interstellar cold-war between the Autobots and Decepticons, with more ambiguous motives for both sides, and a much more complex and steady backstory that evolves over the whole run of the series, presenting an escalation in the ongoing conflict between ideologies.
IDW originally published mini-series, despite the fans relentlessly clamouring for an ongoing series of comics. Rigidly they stuck to the idea, releasing a generation 1 mini-series every spring/summer and a mini-series dealing with Beast Wars, or one of the other transformers lines/continuities in the other part of the year. They also backed up the much more popular G1 series with a number of ‘Spotlights’ on individual characters, to allow some of the lesser-known, but still fan popular characters a chance to do something cool, and for writers to tell some other stories. Each of these also filled in some of the back story of the main series.
The format was clever, and the stories themselves were slick, smooth and clever, all folding together like some kind of sexy robot origami to become a tight, tense and thrilling story that reached a explosive finale.
IDW are still publishing transformers comics, and it’s through them that original Generation 1 fiction, featuring the original characters, as well as fiction tied into the (sigh) Live-action movies is also published, as well as all other licenced transformers comics. Hopefully, their licence will continued for a long, long time, and maybe they can best the record set by marvel’s 331-issue ‘limited series’.
Of course, there are other transformers comics – numerous unofficial fan-published comics exist and have been created, some which are sometimes of quality enough that they could be official, or even superior to the official ones, often created through the fan clubs and conventions based around transformers. There are also numerous Japanese-exclusive mangas that have never been translated, and tie in with exclusive Japanese toys or storylines, some of which are more notorious than others, and very, very distinctly Japanese – most notorious of which, is a series called Transformers: Kiss-players, where the Japanese definition of ‘Teenage’ girls, i.e., barely-sixteen-but-looking-twelve girls work for Earth Defence Command, and have transformer partners they must kiss in order to unlock their special powers and abilities.
No, I am not making this shit up.
The idea of the series and trying to choke it down gives me the worst case of indigestion I’ve ever had, but at least IDW are preventing transformers fans all over the world from turning to alcoholism at the existence of Kiss-Players, and can we do less than salute them, by maybe taking a peek at their comics sometime.
Transformers in comics will go on presumably for a long, long time, as there are always new series coming and going, and the toyline is a flagship brand for Hasbro. One day it might end – but as Simon Furman likes to say – It never ends.
Time I wasn’t here!
