IDW - More Than Meets The Eye #39

Title: The Permanent Revolution

Written by: James Roberts

Art by: Hayato Sakamoto

Colours by: Joana Lafuente

Letters by: Tom B. Long

Coordination: Phases

Editor: John Barber

Plot

[1] Troika

Tarn, Helex and Tesarus have captured and are torturing Blip for the crimes of being involved in a cult and offer him one last request before he dies, which is when he tells Tarn to remove his mask and reveal his true identity, to which Tesarus and Helex simply kill him.

The DJD return to their ship when they encounter their newest member Nickel, who berates them for making a mess of Blip's parts meaning she can't use them for spares, and starts complaining about the team's maintenance skills.

Later, Tesarus is in his Appraisal with Tarn, who is complimenting him on his work with Borebit and Heretech, when Tesarus brings up how Tarn abandoned Vos and Kaon on Ofsted XVII after they were ambused by the Galactic Council whilst trying to take the destroyed Lost Light's Quantum Engines (following them killing the crew).

Tesarus claims to Tarn that Decepticon's don't abandon their teammates, which Tarn takes offence to, as he knows EVERYTHING about being a Decepticon. Soon Helex comes in, and says he's recovered both Vos and Kaon from Ofsted, as they were alive (much to their shock), but he also shows Tarn the new edition of Towards Peace that they took from Trailcutter, which shows Megatron defecting from the Decepticons.

[2] Troska

The DJD return to Messatine where Tarn mulls over these revelations, and tries to kill himself in a tank of Nuke (a supercharged fuel), as his life flashes before his eyes he sees Nickel worriedly looking at him, and decides to break free, announcing a change in plan.

[3] Perestroika

The DJD have tracked down Deathsaurus' warworld, as he is at the top of their list, but Tarn reveals to the team that they aren't there to kill him, or his crew, but simply to talk.

On board the ship, Deathsaurus manages to separate Tarn from the others on the pretence of their talk, but he immediately tries to kill him, on the assumption that that's what they are here for, he also disables his audio sensors so Tarn can't talk him to death, however Tarn hacks into his ship's inter-Decepticon radio frequency and makes the entire crew hear him out, he reveals that due to the recent events of Megatron defecting, he sees that one individual doesn't make up the entire ideal of the Decepticon cause, even if he did start it, and explains how Nickel joined his crew after hearing about the Decepticon ideal, despite being from a now dead colony world called Prion. He invites Deathsaurus and his crew to join him to restart the Decepticons anew, and with a clean slate.

Deathsaurus agrees to join up, if Tarn kills the rest of the DJD, but he refuses. Deathsaurus however reveals that that was a test to see if Tarn treats his men as expendable like Megatron does, and agrees to join forces. 

As such, the united forces decide to target Megatron and the crew of the Lost Light as the first names on the new list....

Characters

Decepticon

Tarn - Tank

Helex - Treaded Mobile Smelting Tank

Tesarus - Treaded Mobile Metal Grinder

Kaon - Variable Volt Harness

Vos - Rifle

Nickel

Deathsaurus

Blue Bacchus

Browning

Gairyu

Yokuryu

Goryu

Rairyu

Kakuryu

Doryu

Leozack

Guyhawk

Jarugar

Killbison

Drillhorn

Deathcobra

Rest of Deathsaurus' Crew

Blip Killed by Tesarus

Soundwave (Flashback)

Alternate Brainstorm - Jet (Flashback) Dies in DJD attack

Alternate Overlord - Tank and Jet (Mentioned) Killed by DJD

Heretech (Mentioned) Captured by DJD

Autobot

Megatron - Tank (Footage)

Optimus Prime (Flashback)

Skids (Flashback)

Alternate Ratchet - Ambulance (Flashback) Killed by DJD

Alternate Drift - Car (Flashback) Killed by DJD

Borebit (Mentioned) Killed by Tesarus

Cybertronian

The Pet

Eucryphia (Mentioned)

Prima (Mentioned)

Thriteen Tribes (Mentioned)

Prion - City/Space Ship (Mentioned) Probably Dead

Prion's Colonists (Mentioned) Killed by Black Block Consortia

Other

Captain K'gard (Flashback)

Galactic Council (Flashback)

Black Block Consortia (Flashback)

Notes

• Blip is shown here in a drastically different design to his previous appearances, this is either an artistic error, due to the new artist, or it's a different character to the previous one.
• The Empyrean Suite is revealed here to be the DJD's "theme tune" and was written by Eucryphia, who was shown to be Nova's ally during the war of the Primes started by Galvatron.
• Tesarus and Helex are revealed to have vehicle modes, meaning we now know the alternate modes for all five of the main DJD members
• This issue confirms without doubt that the alternate Brainstorm was the one who revealed Overlord to the DJD, before this it was just Rewind's theory. One has to wonder though, why didn't the OTHER Brainstorm do the same?
• Tarn has several of his masks sitting on his wall, all somewhat damaged...guess he's sentimental huh?
• Brainstorm's time jump to Messatine in the past altered some of the Nucleon there into the DJD's personal stash of "Nuke"
• The DJD haven't been in contact with Megatron since issue 18 of the Costa Transformers ongoing series
• Deathsaurus' crew is made up of mostly Japanese exclusive Transformers characters. The only ones missing from his Victory cast are Black Shadow (who was killed by the DJD) and Hellbat (who was working with Gigatron)
• Huh...wonder if it's just a coincidence that at the start of the Combiner Wars storyline in the other comics we get a couple of traditionally combiner teams here?
• Nickel is from the Prion colony, showing that female Transformers are available from any of the colonies in theory.
• Speaking of Nickel, she has a few similarities to Fixit from the new Robots in Disguise franchise, meaning she may be a Mini-Con.
• Amongst Tarn's memories, we see a young Skids with his Matrix tattoo, which was also how Skids looked whilst he was helping with the raid of the Primal Basilica in Shadowplay....more evidence for him being Roller perchance?
• It's revealed here that the Galactic Council and Black Block Consortia have started attacking Cybertronian colonies and outposts to try and wipe out the Cybertronians, considering their dwindling numbers now.
• Tarn states that he erases his list in this issue....this means that technically the Scavengers and Drift should be off the list now, and won't be hunted by the DJD.
• Tarn also realizes that the Lost Light crew are still alive, but doesn't question how or why, he just knows he wants them dead.

IDW - More Than Meets the Eye #8

Staff

Title: Scavengers (part 2): Who's afraid of the DJD?

Written by: James Roberts

Art by: Alex Milne

Colour by: Josh Burcham

Letters by: Shawn Lee

Editor: John Barber

Plot

Years ago, Fulcrum and his fellow K-Class Decepticons are airdropped onto Clemency during a battle, where Fulcrum doesn't seem too happy about things.

Back in the present the Scavengers are all panicking about the D.J.D. coming to kill one of them, and decide between them that their only chance is to fight them, Krok even has plans to use the still stasis-locked Grimlock as well.

On the Lost Light, Skids and Chromedome have met up in the Oil Reservoir, where Skids asks Chromedome to read his mind so he can remember his lost memories.

On Clemency the Scavengers have set up Grimlock's "coffin" with circuit speeders (taken from the Monstercon they found before) that when opened will give Grimlock an adrenaline boost. Tarn contacts the Scavengers and they say the traitor has been killed and is in a coffin for them to pick up. Tarn reveals that he's upset that he can't kill Fulcrum himself. The group look at Fulcrum, who starts to explain what he did, but is cut short when the D.J.D. land on Clemency.

Tarn opens Grimlock's coffin and the Dinobot immediately attacks him, but he is easily subdued, which Krok can't understand why. Helex appears behind the Scavengers as they try to escape and they're drawn into fighting the D.J.D.

Back on the Lost Light, Chromedome cuts the mind-reading short when he starts seeing disturbing things, and certain song that he never wants to hear really, and says that Skids doesn't want to remember these things as the memories weren't suppressed they were destroyed.

On Clemency Tesarus puts Flywheels through his mincing chest, which shreds his upper body into little pieces. Kaon restrains Krok whilst Vos puts his spike-backed face mask over Krok's own face, causing immense pain, Misfire tries to save him, but ends up shooting him instead. Misfire is attacked by The Pet, who starts chewing his arm. Crankcase is thrown across the battlefield by Helex and lands near Fulcrum, who runs off, however Crankcase sees something and remembers what Worldsweepers were famous for.

Tarn starts using his weaponized speech to try and kill Grimlock, but is stopped by Crankcase inside a ginat battle suit. The D.J.D. fight Crankcase in his new suit and destroy it.

Fulcrum decides enough is enough and declares to the D.J.D. that he's not afraid any more, and that he thinks the Scavengers are worth ten of them, he then transforms to his bomb mode and launches towards Tarn, intending to kill himself and the D.J.D. He lands with barely an explosion, but before anything else can happen Kaon informs Tarn that he's located where Overlord is. The group leave immediately to hunt down their primary target, and Tarn reveals that all of the Scavengers are now on his list to kill.

The Scavengers find Fulcrum still intact, and Misfire reveals that they removed his explosive before he woke up (in case he blew up on them), and he then explains how he was arrested for cowardice and sent to Styx, but before he could be killed there he was conscripted into the K-Class by Megatron, and his team were deployed as weapons against the Autobots on Clemency. Crankcase brings back Krok, badly hurt, but still alive. Misfire tries talking to Grimlock, but discovers that his brain is basically destroyed, which explains why he was left behind on that ship. The Scavengers decode to head back to Cyberton with Grimlock in tow, to use him as a bargaining chip. Either as a gift to Megatron if the Decepticons won, or to return him to the Autobots if they won, for leniency. Before they leave however they scavenge through Flywheels' remains for anything they can find.

18 months later a robot (most likely the Necrobot) arrives on Clemency and adds/removes Flywheels' name to his list, right after Hound, Chromedome, Dipstick, Drift and Ultra Magnus....

Characters

Autobot

Grimlock - Tyrannosaurus Rex Mostly Brain Dead

Chromedome - Car

Skids - Van

Rewind - Memory Stick

Pipes - Truck

Swerve - Van

First Aid - Ambulance

Ultra Magnus (On the List)

Hound (On the List)

Dipstick (On the List)

Drift (On the List)

Diplomatic Corps (Mentioned)

Decepticon

Misfire - Jet

Spinister - Helicopter

Krok Face Crushed by Vos

Crankcase

Flywheels - Tank/Jet Killed by Tesarus

Fulcrum - Disarmed Bomb

Tarn - Tank

Kaon - Electric Chair

Tesraus - Metal Mincer

Vos - Sniper Rifle

Helix - Mobile Smelting Pool

Torque - Bomb Dead

K-Class Cons - Bombs Dead

A Monstercon (Mentioned) Dead

Megatron (Mentioned)

Genericons (Mentioned)

Banzai-Tron (mentioned)

Overlord (Mentioned)

Other

"The Pet"

Tailgate - Car

Proteus (Mentioned)

Mortilus (Mentioned)

Necrobot

Notes

• The K in K-Class/K-Cons likely stands for Kamikaze
• Rather than splitting into 2 vehicles, Flywheels is a triple changer (as he was shown converting into tank mode last issue, and jet mode this issue)
• The Lost Light has Movie Nights...this is awesome!
• This story references the events of the 2012 Annual, but the book was postponed to after this issue
• Tarn's transformation addiction is shown in this issue, he's shown changing from tank-bot-tank-bot within 4 panels and even changes to tank mode during his fight with Grimlock as well (and then changing back again)
• The song Skids keeps hearing is called The Empyrean Suite, this is likely the song Tarn plays as well
• Vos' line of "Wear My Face" is clearly an inversion of Optimus' line "Give me your face" from ROTF
• This issue shows that Sparkeaters can come in various forms (the one from the Lost Light was more standard robot-like, whilst The Pet is a Turbofox)
• Boy Kaon sure does looks like an evil version of Rung doesn't he?
• The Worldsweeper ships come with several "Cybernaughts", giant battle suits for Transformers to ride in
• Tarn has read Banzai-Tron's files of every Decepticon, and has ranked everyone in order of importance etc
• Grimlock has been rendered basically brain dead since he was last seen. This is likely due to Overlord torturing him on G-9. How he got off the planet is still a mystery though.
• It's assumed that the robot on the last page is the Necrobot, but there's actually no actual proof of that (he probably is though)
• Krok is usually shown holding a small rod in his hand, this is something connected to his squad, which he seems to think is still around. The others think they aren't.
• Despite being dumb as toast, Spinister is actually a skilled surgeon! (Maybe the Lost Light can get him to work on Rung?)
• The list on the last panel is most likely misleading on some of those names, as shown earlier in both MTMTE and RID, some characters have shared names (Prowl on Delphi and Prowl on Cybertron, Autobot Skydive and Decepticon Skydive) so some may be misleading like that, such as with Hound or Drift (though unique names like Ultra Magnus are unlikely to be duplicated).
• Krok is referred to as a Genericon by Kaon, this is most likely just an insult, and doesn't mean he's part of the same group as the guys shock in the Delphi storyline.
• In the background, Spinister can be seen using his rotor blade as a sword...awesome
• Fulcrum didn't turn into his bomb mode in the first place because he was too afraid of dying, and this was his D.J.D. crime as well, he lived.