Sixshot
Writer: Simon Furman
Artist: Rob Ruffalo
(covers by Rob Ruffalo and James Raiz)
Synopsis: Sixshot is the most powerful Decepticon period. He thinks of himself as a soul-less force of nature. When his associates, the Terrorcons (the combiner team), go missing on a routine mission, he follows after them, determined to investigate their ultimate fate. What he finds when he arrives puts his powers to their greatest test yet.
Comments: Another interesting look at a TF character. In this case, Sixshot has had no prior comic appearances (to my knowledge, anyway). Although he was a prominent character in the japanese Headmasters cartoon. I like Furman's depiction here--that Sixshot is basically a destructive force of nature. In this case, Sixshot needs to decide if that is all he is or if he can be something more then the sum of his parts. The art was pretty good--it didn't really stand out in my mind but was good enough not to detract from the story.
Recommended.
***
Transformers Escalation #2
Writer: Simon Furman
Artist: E.J. Su
(cover art by E.J. Su and Klaus Scherwinski)
Synopsis: The plot continues to unfold as Ironhide recalls what happened to Sunstreaker last issue to Optimus Prime. Prime, Jazz and Wheeljack track down a garage with Sunstreaker's remains where they're attacked. The humans start to get away but Prime stops them (and how!) Elsewhere, Megatron continues with his plan to assert control of Earth.
Comments: Generally, I've been enjoying this iteration of Transformers. I have to say, though, that this issue seemed mostly like filler. I also got the impression that Megatron would be some sort of tank in this series--I'm more then a little disappointed they gravitated back to the gun. Yes, it's classic but I thought the whole point of this series was to make things "now" and turned some of the established lore on it's head. Art was good and the surprise about Sunstreaker's fate was welcome...
Recommended.
***
GIJOE vs. Transformers (volume 4) #1 (of #2)
"Black Horizon"
Writer: Tim Seeley
Artist: Andrew Wildman
(Cover "A" by Tim Seeley, Jeremy Freeman and Jean-Francois Beaulieu;
Cover "B" by Tim Seeley, Robert D. Atkins and Rob Ruffalo;
Cover "C" by Tim Seeley, Clayton Brown and Jean-Francois Beaulieu)
Synopsis: Starts in the 70s, when the original GIJOE, Joe Colton, leads his adventure team against some Chinese soldiers in Tibet. They are quickly captured by Cobra-La. In the present, Hawk has been possessed by the Autobot Matrix and is haunted by visions of destruction. The Autobots lead a covert operation against the remains of Cobra, retrieving their stolen Cybertronian technology, with the aide of Hawk and Firewall. Later, Optimus, Hawk and Flint go to the location of Cobra La, seeking something... The Autobot ship meanwhile, is attacked at it's underwater location by the Monster Pretenders. Back in the caves, Prime fights Bludgeon while Hawk and Flint are beseiged by Cobra La soldiers. Firewall calls the rest of the GIJOE team and tells Duke they need their help immediately! We get a history lesson--how Unicron came to Earth 160,000 years ago but Cobra La threatened him with a metal eating spore. They tell Unicron to come back some day, once humanity has evolved sufficiently. He can eat civilization, leaving the world behind for Cobra La to solely inhabit. It's revealed Prime, Hawk and Flint are reading this from cave paintings. Then Cobra La finds them and they prepare to make their final stand when Joe Colton returns and tells them to come with him if they want to live.
Comments: This continues the story of the three previous crossovers. To be honest, I skipped most of them--the stories didn't exactly fire my imagination. They had the feel of extended cartoons to me... Fortunately, this forth volume is a mere two issues (double-sized ones) and I thought I could tolerate the story for that long. The story is decent and attempts to combine all the elements of Joe and TF lore in one shot. The art is decent but not Wildman at his best--there are several frames which lack detail and/or are unclear (does Optimus stare at Hot Rod or actually hit him? I can't tell from the art). It seems like Wildman's getting lazy--or perhaps he was rushed. Firewall's pig tail look annoys the hell out of me--what grown woman wears their hair like that? (a minor thing, but...) The story is a who's-who of Transformers--Eject, the Monster Pretenders, Skids, Bludgeon, etc. I'm a bit neutral on this aspect, it just was a lot of characters running around. It was cool to see Joe Colton thrown in there (along with the kitchen sink :). I do question Cobra La's plan though--why not have destroyed Unicron and then turned their power against humanity? It's likely Unicron would destroy much of the surface in an attack--or even the entire planet, in defiance of them--so, why take that risk? They could've destroyed Unicron, crushed humanity then built their own
civilization in lieu of man. Finally, Cobra-La-la-la-la-la-la-la-la! (so irrestibly corny! :)
Mildly recommended.
(borrowed images of the Joe/TF crossover covers from seibertron.com obviously--saves me time buying them all).
