IDW - Synergy: A Hasbro Creators Showcase

Cover Art by: Sara Pitre-Durocher

Letters and Design by: Christa Miesner

Edits by: Megan Brown

An Arcee Sort of Day

Written by: Peri Mercer

Drawn by: Umi Miyao

Coloured by: Elaina Unger

Plot

Following the end of their long war, the Cybertronians are at peace, and their lives have become mundane.

Arcee, once a fierce warrior, has just been refused a loan for a house and heads back to her apartment, dealing with road rage and bar fights along the way, however when she gets home, she is greeted by her pet cat, and realizes that things aren't all that bad after all...

Characters

Arcee - Car

Loan Officer - Stealth Bomber

Road Rager - Van

Traffic Bots - Various Cars

Other Loan Applicants

Security Bots

Bar Patrons

Bartender

Damus

Unicron Cultists

Arcee's Pussy Cat

Unicron (Mentioned)

Ghost

Written and Drawn by: Emma Vieceli

Coloured by: Ronda Pattison

Plot

Dawn Moreno, the new Snake Eyes used to be afraid of ghosts as a kid, but since she has taken on the mantle from the dead original Snake Eyes, and has been communing with him, and learning about his life, she has gotten over this fear, and now feels she has a purpose to give a ghost a voice of his own...

Characters

Dawn Moreno/Snake Eyes II

Ghost movie Actress (Footage)

Snake Eyes I (Flashback/Ghost) Dead

Scarlett (Flashback)

Timber, the Wolf (Flashback)

Snake Eyes' Enemies (Flashback)

Recharge

Written, Drawn and Coloured by: Sarah Winifred Searle

Plot

A meme, comparing Misfits band member Stormer to a manatee has gone viral, and bandmate Pizzazz is pissed off about it, but Stormer doesn't let it get to her, as she's used to people judging her based on her looks, she leaves for a walk and bumps into her girlfriend, Kimber, who asks her to meet with her later.

Soon, Stormer stops by a café, where she sits outside reading a book, and decides to stay out there when it starts raining down on her...

Characters

Stormer/Mary Phillips

Pizzazz/Phyllis Gabor

Kimber Benton

Waitress

Shana Elmsford (Mentioned)

Misfits Fans (Mentioned)

Misfits Critics (Mentioned)

The Stage

Written by: Katie Cook

Drawn by: Agnes Garbowska

Coloured by: Heather Breckel

Plot

In the mid-eighties, Katie Cook was a weird kid who used to play with her My Little Pony toys, and loved to make stories about them, which included body horror and happy dance numbers.

When she grew up, and came to enjoy the newer cartoon, she was approached to create a comic series about her favourite toys, which she relished in, treating it like she did as a kid, having fun, and trying to entertain others.

Unfortunately, she is annoying to her own kids, who don't want to hear about how the comics and stories are made by their mother, but want to make their own stories with their own toys...again including body horror (but this time with glitter though!)

Characters

Real People

Katie Cook

Harper Cook

Grayson Cook

Andy Price

IDW Editor Bobby (Mentioned)

Benny Hill (Mentioned)

Fictional

G1 Locket

G1 Baby Half Note

G1 Sea Breeze

G1 Starflower

G1 Applejack

G1 Twilight

G1 Baby Cuddles

G4 Twilight Sparkle

G4 Pinkie Pie

G4 Fluttershy

G4 Leadwing

G4 Bittersweet

G4 Sunset Shimmer

G4 Applejack

G4 Rarity

G4 Princess Luna

G4 Princess Celestia

Equestria Girls Twilight Sparkle

Equestria Girls Fluttershy

TOO MANY G1 PONIES TO NAME!!

G4 Discord (Mentioned)

Of Flying and Falling

Written by: Mairghread Scott

Drawn by: Sara Pitre-Durocher

Coloured by: Joana LaFuente

Plot

When she was young, Mairghread Scott and her sister used to love the Beast Wars cartoon, and used to act out their own battles and scenes between the characters in their back garden.

Despite her love for the cartoon though, Mairghread hated that there was only two female characters in the series, and was upset when her favourite, Airazor, was written out, but despite this, she kept a part of Airazor inside her, and wouldn't let it die.

Eventually she learns about the newly fan-poll created character Windblade, and allies to write for her new series.

Time passes, and Mairghread has published a few series focusing on Windblade, and even included a larger library of female characters than she had as a child, whilst setting up her booth at a convention, she is approached by a small girl, clutching a Windbalde toy, who says she's her favourite character, which Mairghread agrees to as well...

Characters

Real People

Mairghread Scott

Mairghread's Sister

Mairghread's Husband

Mairghread's Teacher

Random People

Convention Goers

Fictional

Airazor - Falcon

Dinobot - Velociraptor

Optimus Primal - Gorilla

Cheetor - Cheetah

Rattrap - Rat

Rhinox - Rhino

Tigatron - White Tiger

Tigerhawk - Winged Tiger

Megatron - Tyrannosaurus Rex

Blackarachnia - Black Widow Spider

Tarantulas - Tarantula

Scorponok - Scorpion

Waspinator - Wasp

Inferno - Fire Ant

Terrorsaur - Pterodactyl 

Windblade - VTOL Fighter Jet

Chromia - Speedbike

Moonracer - Sports Car

Strika - Battle Tank

Elita One

Mistress of Flame

Greenlight

Lancer

Lightbright

Optimus Prime Plushie 

Generic Superheroes

Overall Notes

• Okay, first off, I want to thank Crunch Comics in Reading for helping me get my hands on this comic, I couldn't find any UK sellers anywhere other than them. Please give them a look if you need specific comics or are just in the Reading area :)
• I've decided to put ALL the notes for this comic in one section, rather than one for each individual story, where needed. I'll TRY to keep the notes in order, but no promises :D
• This anthology comic was made to celebrate international women's day/month and showcases several female members of IDW's creative team. The series is named after the female computer from Jem and the Holograms....now...when do we get Male Synergy or Teletraan-1? 
• The three franchise comics are each three pages long, and the two biopics are seven pages each, making the complete book just 23 pages long of new content (excluding the print/cover reprints and title pages) Making the double cover price a bit odd...
• Just for the record, I don't follow the GI Joe: Real American Hero, Jem and the Holograms or My Little Pony comics, so if I make any dumb errors in my analysis etc, please forgive me (a lot of these have either no or little fan wikis to help me out either)
• Of the three franchise comics, only the Transformers one is currently impossible to be in continuity with the IDW continuity, either the new one or previous, so maybe this is just set in another continuity, ala Deviations (ie, "In a world where Arcee got a cat instead of a girlfriend!"
• Arcee's redesign in this book is an amalgamation of her IDW design and the Power of the Primes/Siege female Autobot toy design, possibly hinting at a new toy perhaps?
• The loan officer appears to use Megatron's stealth bomber body, but with a new head and some slightly different kibble.
• They don't say where the mean comments about Stormer are being shared is, in the Jem story, but from the talk about followers, memes and rabid fanbases being set upon people, we can all assume it's Twitter.
• So....why does Stormer just sit out in the rain, with her book in hand? That's just going to ruin the book if nothing else!
• In the MLP biopic story, I've only bothered to identify the toys and characters shown that have either a noticeable role in the story, or are named themselves, there is literally a panel with at least three dozen ponies in it....I AM NOT INSANE!!!
• Just to prove that I did try however, I spent about an hour trying to identify a character on the TV in one panel, because I wanted to be thorough.
• In Katie's childhood bedroom , she has a Mr Potatohead figure....what a Hasbro shill!!
• In one panel it's mentioned that G1 Applejack is the toy being played with, but the figure shown is purple, not orange like the character herself...I PAY ATTENTION OKAY!!!
• During the Beast Wars biopic, Dinobot is mentioned as being a Predacon...this was only the case for episode one of the series when he flipped sides to a Maximal (which is also his faction in the toyline). Maybe Mairghread and her sister just liked him to be a Predacon over a Maximal?
• I don't know if the superheroes on the TV in Mairghread's childhood are actually supposed to be from something, but I don't recognise them....sorry if they're important!
• The final panel with Mairghread at a convention is, for those who do not attend Transformers conventions, very accurate to what you'd see there, from cosplayers to people carrying plushies of characters they like
• I'm not going to count the characters who appear on the comic covers on Mairghread's table in my character checklist by the way, since they're too small to count, but I just wanted to say that I did notice them!
• Due to the size, it's difficult to tell, but I believe the Windblade toy the little girl is holding is the Titans Return version...which if it's anything like my one....BE CAREFUL WITH THE HEAD!! IT JUST POPS RIGHT OFF!!!

IDW - Go-Bots #5

Story/Art/Letters: Tom Scioli

Edits: David Hedgecock

Plot

Spay-C gives Turbo a lift up to the ascending Command Center, so they can rescue Scooter inside, Turbo manages to get his way inside, but is ambushed on every floor by the Renegades, however he manages to easily defeat everything that is thrown at him. Eventually he finds his way to the Reprogramming center, where he looks into the records and discovers that Scooter volunteered to have his memories altered so he didn't feel bad about A.J.'s death, but Turbo screwed it up by removing him too early, causing severe brain damage for him!

Turbo smashes into the control room, where he takes down the Renegades guarding Cy-Kill, however Turbo manages to get an upperhand on Cy-Kill and shoots him through the eyes, killing the Renegade leader instantly.

Turbo soon finds and frees Scooter, before returning to the control room to take control of the ship, but Crasher tries to fend him off, after Turbo points out that both Leader-1 and Cy-Kill are dead, their war should die with them, which she agrees to.

Shortly, the Thruster and the Command Center return to the Earth, where Turbo and Crasher reveal their agreed alliance, much to everyone's joy. Major Domo reveals to the astronauts that the dematerializer is actually a time machine and can allow them and Spay-C to return to the past to try and repair their society, however two of the astronauts decide to stay on the current Earth, to try and rebuild it with the remaining humans.

The two ships return to Gobotron where they find the streets smashed up and swarmed with Vamps, led by Braxis, before they have to deal with them though, they are saved by Road Ranger and his allies, who tear through the army and impress everyone assembled, and he leads the assorted group to Gobotropolis to take control of the world.

Later, Spay-C and the remaining two human astronauts enter the dematerializer, hoping that this will work, but even the Go-bots left behind have no idea if it would work, as they may have either been killed upon entry or their own timeline will be replaced by a new one.

Shortly afterwards, Road Ranger, now in charge of Gobotron, decides to finally leave their past behind and separates the planet, freeing Earth, and leaving for another system to call their own.

The remaining humans on Earth say goodbye to the Go-Lems and leave across the seas to rebuild fresh elsewhere, they soon learn that some Go-bots have remained on Earth to defend it, and even them if need be, with Screw Head killing Magmar, who was intending to kill them for intruding on his land.

Whilst on their way to their new home space, Road Ranger starts work on creating an heir for himself, to ignite a new generation on Gobotron, and he urges his friends to do so too, he also decides that he wants to start seeding the multiverse with Gobotrons of their own, each with a name and identity of their own.

Road Ranger, thinking that Cy-Kill and Leader-1 were too dangerous to be reborn, decides to create a new Go-bot using their parts, hoping to create a better version of them both for the future....

Back in the past, Spay-C and his two remaining astronaut passengers return to Earth, before the Go-bot revolution begins, and try to warn their bosses about it's arrival, however their bosses are unhappy with them for returning home too early, but also for somehow losing half of their crew, and refuse to believe them, certain that the government's measures in place to control the Go-bots will hold....as a message alert comes through, informing them of Cy-Kill going rogue....

Characters

Guardian

Command Center - Fortress

Major Domo - Sports Car

Tic Toc - Watch

Pathfinder - Space Ship

Small Foot - Pick-up Truck

Leader-1 - Fighter Jet Dead

Rest-Q - Ambulance (Footage Only)

Other Guardians

Renegade

Cy-Kill/Go-Cyle Red - Motorcycle Killed by Turbo

Crasher - Race Car

Fitor - Jet

Tank - Tank

Buggy Man - Buggy

Crain Brain - Crane

Geeper Creeper - Jeep

Loco - Locomotive Sent to Wild West Era by Turbo

Thruster - Shuttle

Other Renegades

Go-Lem

Boulder - Tungsten

Magmar - Igneous Rock Killed by Screw Head

Granite - Granite

Other Go-Lems

Next Generation Go-Bot

Starscream - Fighter Jet Constructed from Cy-Kill and Leader-1's remains

Optimus Prime (Mentioned)

Bumblebee (Mentioned)

Other Go-Bot

Spay-C - Space Shuttle Returned to Pre-Revolution Era

Turbo - Race Car

Scooter - Scooter

Road Ranger - Truck

Vamp Army - Monstrous Cars Destroyed by Road Ranger and Allies

Bug Bite - VW Beetle

Von Joy - Sports Car

Zeemon - Sports Car

Destroyer - Tank

Staks - Truck

Screw Head - Drill Tank

Dive-Dive - Submarine

Human

Charlotte Scott Returned to Pre-Revolution Era

Venyamin Alexander Returned to Pre-Revolution Era

Lee Spencer

Other Astronaut

Professor Braxis Killed by Road Ranger

Primitive Humans 

Nick Burns Skeleton inside Leader-1's Body

NASA Bosses (In the Pre-Revolution Era Only)

Matt Hunter (Flashback Only)

A.J. Foster (Flashback Only)

Cy-Kill's Creator (Flashback Only)

T. Coriander Banks (Flashback Only)

Native Americans (Flashback Only)

Notes

• Okay...now Earth, which has been trapped inside of Gobotron for centuries (maybe much more) also has land borders, generally associated with farmland (see picture just above)....WHERE DO THEY GET THEIR SUNLIGHT?!?!
• Also, despite previous appearances from the last two issues, we see there is an ocean around the ISLAND they have been on in this story so far...what happened to the desolate landscape from the previous issues?!
• Fitor gets incinerated by Turbo in the fuel station, but he's later seen perfectly fine in the control room with Cy-Kill. Now, it may be possible that he survived the explosive looking fire...but how did he get back to Cy-Kill with no injuries?
• Turbo mentions how his showdown with Loco has "been a long time coming"...but I'm pretty sure this is the first we've ever seen them together!
• Cy-Kill mentions that Leader-1 had control of all disintegrations and regenerations on Go-bots, with the later reveal that the Dematerializer is actually a Time Tunnel (aka a time machine) this implies that there's a recall switch on it for people sent back in time to be recalled again, unless by regeneration they mean reconstruction from scratch.
• It's revealed that Cy-Kill's original name was Go-Cycle Red, and he was designed for other Go-bots to use him for transport (most likely for those without land-based or other appropriate alternate modes)
• Two of the astronauts remain on the current Earth to help rebuild it, with Charlotte and the other one going back in time with Spay-C. I would give their names, but we don't know which one is which because they've never really been name-checked in the series properly. From last issue's dialogue, one of the astronauts to remain appears to be the completely unnamed one, the other one is the black astronaut, so just judging by their names, I'd guess he is Lee Spencer (he doesn't look too Russian)..so don't moan at me if I got it wrong in the end.
• Turbo mentions that he HAS been to the surface of Gobotron in the past, so I guess he abandoned Leader-1 and his cause after the planet was sealed inside the artificial world?
• How did Braxis and the Vamp army make it to Gobotron before the Command Center and Thruster? Is there a tunnel leading from Earth to the outer world? (As it isn't seen later either btw)
• Road Ranger mentions how he has never been to Earth and was born on Gobotron....then why does he have a very Earth-looking alternate mode? If he was born and developed to live on Gobotron, then he would have treads rather than wheels, which are mostly suited for a friction based ground, like on Earth rather than a smooth and metallic world like Gobotron.
• In the scene showing Cy-Kill and Leader-1 "playing" as a test, we see T. Coriander Banks and someone else, who based on his hair colour and Gobotics background I'll guess is Braxis in the background.
• Umm...why are Leader-1 and Cy-Kill being developed together? One's a military weapon and the other is a transport tool...shouldn't there be different departments for these different types of Go-bot?
• Loco wound up in the Wild West working as a steam locomotive when he was thrown through time
• There's no Moon around orbiting Earth when Gobotron is separated....THEY'RE ALL GUNNA DIE!!!
• Despite being clearly named "Go-Lems" in this story, the map at the end of the story calls them "Rock Lords".... 
• It's heavily implied that Road Ranger's "son", who is an "optimized" version of himself, is going to be Optimus Prime, we can also assume based on appearance, the Bug Bite's "son" will be Bumblebee.
• Inside Leader-1's corpse we see the long dead skeleton of Nick Burns, who was killed during Leader-1 and Cy-Kill's battle at the end of ISSUE ONE! How is there still a skeleton in there?!?
• The combined rebirth of Cy-Kill and Leader-1 is unmistakably Starscream, which makes me somewhat ashamed that I never realized that putting Cy-Kill's colour scheme onto Leader-1 would give us a Starscream look-alike!
• We see on the last page that the astronauts arrive back on Earth just as Cy-kill goes rogue and is about to start his revolution, and we also learn that a space station in Earth's orbit, designed by Go-bots is actually named "Gobotron", explaining the starting point of the future planet around the Earth! We can assume that following the revolution, the Go-bots went into orbit and expanded on the satellite, eventually covering the Earth and growing outwards...YIKES!
• It's left open to interpretation whether the astronauts succeeded in stopping the revolution, but considering we get a panel on the next page showing a scene from issue one of Leader-1 on a mission, we can assume that everything will still happen as before.
• One has to wonder however, what is going to happen with the Spay-C and astronauts that are already alive in this time frame? Will the older versions of themselves seek them out for added help or are they just going to stay in deep space until Spay-C returns them home like he did in issue three?
• Okay, super theory time, considering the ending implying that the Gobots are going to become the Transformers, and that Earth is being rebuilt, AND all the disparaging references to the Transformers as Go-bots in the GI Joe vs Transformers series, I'm willing to assume that this series has in fact been a prequel to Tom Scioli's previous GI Joe vs Transformers series, eventually both worlds have forgotten about the other, in most ways, Earth is rebuilt to look like it did in the last 20th century, but still with space craft and other stupidly advanced things, and they have an innate hatred of transforming robots due to the old stories. Even the Go-Lems can be explained as having combined into one, and becoming the robot mode of Atlas from the last issue of that series!
• Either that, or this is just another set of toys that Scarlett is playing with in the mental asylum after having murdered her family and half the staff last time :)