Spoiler: refrance the spoiler I mean, there were a limited number of sparks for making cold-cons, so. Depending on how long those stores lasted without a war and MTOs to chew through them... probably, yes :P I don't know what you mean by 'stasis transformers'? D'you mean inhibitor claws sticking everyone being used as a 'machine' in their alt?
Spoiler No I'm referring to the handcuffs everyone is wearing now. I thought those were called stasis cuffs. But either way, under that rhetoric, those need to be actual born people, right? If it was essential it would have been born, and all. I am also deeply hoping megatron goes into professor 'your ideology is wrong let me explain you a thing' mode over that, and also how if everyone is forged then killing redundant ones is going against primus' wishes or whatever.
Spoiler OH yeah that makes sense sorry, my brain is still a little melty. And is... disturbingly likely. welp. dark hasbro give me the forbidden developmental physiology how does alt-acquisition work Megs Explaining A Thing would be. beautiful. and in conjunction with how willing Rewind is to fight Literally Everyone about functionism up to and including the council, I am. Excited. and possibly have a new crackship to add to the armada whoops
Okay. Here goes nothing. Because if I stall any longer I'll never get to the parts that Sarah Stone drew. Spoiler: DC Vol. 1 Previously on: Transformers! I forgot half this shit happened bc I was dragging my feet so much! (bumblebee's goldenrod frame looks like shit :') Gorlam Prime aka Planet No One Actually Cares About If Fucking OP Didnt Insist On Going There For Some Fucking Reason. Jhiaxus exists. Idk) .... I didn't miss Nova Prime at all. asshat It... amuses me deeply that I didn't even notice Cyclonus' frame looking different the first time aorund. GOD. He looks so baby faced without the cheekholes haha *eats up the lore about the dead universe to add to my Unicron characterization* Also... i love that contrast between Cyclonus quoting Alpha Trion (Spread the Cybertronian way - Freedom - Across the whole galaxy) and Nova (Impose the will of cybertron across all of creation) like just. That Rhetorical mismatch. It's beautiful. "Something fascinating and - as far as the titan and its pilot are concerned... Uniquely painful." Shockwave you ass. bluhhhhhhhh go awayyyyyy rattrap "The Empire of Starscream the First" baby please. please. "Not Bumblebee's autobots you dunce! I need an expert!" Starscream is so viciously mean during DC because he always closes right up in crisis :c blablabla OP stop summarizing your dumb misadventure. Roddy... my son.... his interactions with OP always make me sad... (Also Garnak is genuinely sweet.) ... I think I missed Percy correcting Pax on the "Autobot ship" part the first time around. Huh. (They don't draw Starscream prettily enough. He looks hysterical and yell-y. I mean he's probably screaching, but still.) Also OP is so irritating as a narrator. Annoying. Bee can't even keep a handle on people who freely chose to follow him into the wastelands. Also Prowl stop being mean to the dinobots. Also Arcee being angry is still <3<3<3 "I guess if nothing else... I lived to see Prowl put his foot in his mouth." hehehehe fuckin... Shockwave sounds so deranged in these bits. It's actually kind of sad considering his whole everything really. HUH! Shockwave calls Nova Prime "My Liege". That's usually what he calls Megatron isn't it? "NOBODY ORDERS DINOBOTS BUT DINOBOTS, GOLDENROD!" angry dinobots are my fav dinobots HOWEVER! the stuff bumblebee says here makes no goddamn sense. Either Arcee and Ironhide take point OR the DInobots take point! There aren't that many people there! They can't all take point! Fuck's sake! I mean I assume he wanted.... Slaaaaag? I think? the triceratops one. To take point, considering he immediately orders him to get the other dinobots to spread out along the perimeter, but... ???? Bee you're an awful commander. Even considering that, with as little people as you have you can't make three people take point! Especially because that's not how taking point even works. "For all the good that'll do." "What's that?" "I said "Say the word and we'll start blasting"." Arcee is actually hiding behind her mask of ultraviolent hardcore to an extend and that breaks my heart. ... She and Whirl. Have Arcee and Whirl ever interacted in canon for an extened amoutn of time? I need to know this. I restate my earlier assessment: The Dead Universe is SBURB. Also while I appreciate Starscream having confidence in himself as a warrior, it's kind of a step backwards and =/ Also this art is... so dark and inky. Mhhhhhh. Also while I understand why everyone's all grumpy about starscream... I'm also feeling baaaaad. (THOUGH I DO NOTICE THAT IT IS RODIMUS WHO IS DEFENDING HIM! AND I LIKE THAT!) Also OP still sounds incredibly gay for Megatron. Damn. ... I live for Whirl being bad decisions friend who tries to get Cyclonus to acknowledge his emotions. In hindsight that's just kind of beautiful. Jazz grumping at Starscream and playing big tough badmech is... oddly charming. "But ain't nobody's luck last forever." "... lovely." yadda yadda explanation of the prophecy. Though tbh i remember going "you ahve a very narrow idea of betrayal probably lol" at this but... I mean he's right, Starscream never did say he was on the dude's side. So it's not like he really betrayed him? He made no promises? ... The last time i read this I did not know about Unicron. Now I know about Unicron and really, like... historically. The prophecy wasn't ever about Starscream. He was just incidental to it. Which tbh makes a lot of sense considering that in most continuities anythign to do with Unicron ends up being really bad for Starscream. Dude is the opposite of what I'd consider aligned with the Unmaker which is kind of interesting. The prophecy really firmly points to Shockwave, which makes sense. But it also kind of points at OP to some degree? Which... how you could read this bit "Stars will Scream" too, is, it does not necessarily indicate that this is Starscream's fault tbh. It actually kind of implies the opposite. It implies that Starscream well... screams a lot. For a religious nut Scoop is kind of bad at this. (tbh there is a lot of conspiracy bullshit I could be saying about OP and Unicron here but I will cut it short bc no one needs to know how freewheeling my theories can get) ... yup black energon, right I remember. I mean I didn't know about TFP before reading this but liiiiike. It's exceedingly clear that the Dead Universe and Unicron don't ust go together nicely because of thematic similarities. Iiiiit's meant to be. ...When even Prowl is like "no we should stop thinking things over over and over again and do something" you know it's bad. HI SOUNDY! HI BABE! Starscream you should really stop talking to dead people like... I know you miss Metalhawk but... "Oh and... sorry I killed you, pal." ouch. GOD WHY ARE THE CONS AND THE BOTS FIGHTING THAT'S SO DUMB!!!!! YOU IDIOTS! Also wow Rattrap you are stupid. The end of the world is not a last move you want to end with, because then there's nothing for you to win. WHY ARE THEY ALL SO SHORTSIGHTED? ... Soundwave didn't know the constructicons followed prowl? omg Also all this infighting and squabbling is stupid. ... Soundwave and Prowl should fight. and then maybe kiss. That anger and resentment and those pretty pointed barbs Also Bee is a born Auspistize, tbh. "So my friends down there, I'm pretty sure they- they're gonna start shooting at me, pretty soon. You know how friends are." cries softly. Poor Starscream... poor poor starscream... Booooooom oh god arcee is so scared D: And prowl is... so unsettled. and Angry. (This falling out between him and Bee is... kidn of uncomfortable tbh. Considering that like... while prowl was out of it for most of the time he kind of knows Bee is bad at leadering on his own. So this is super unfair.) To be honest... that was so cool of Starscream... it's like legitemately the first time he didn't run away to save his own hide. He stood trying to protect Iacon. This is REALLY HUGE, tbh. KNOWING WHAT METALHAWK AND STARSCREAM'S HISTORY IS THIS SI SUPER PAINFUL MY HEART BLEEDS Starscream's little smile. He's... actually kind of glad his friend is a zombie who is angry at him. Brainstorm... flirting with percy... gosh. Rattrap is stirring shit as usual. *dances* I STILL THINK IT'S VERY UNLIKELY THAT STARSCREAM HAS ANYTHING TO DO WITH UNICRONIST BULLSHIT SHUT UP SCOOP omg the rodpod is still the best thing ever. poor rung he is not a fighter at all ... I somehow missed that Rodimus is into spray painting :O CUTE Holy shit I totally missed that... Frenzy died during DC.... like proper greyed out frame and everything... D: Soundwave looks so distraught at Megatron's screaming :c Megatron being all "Lol did you honestly think I'd restore the Primes?" is hilarious. driving right into Metroplexe's eyesocket is still cool as hell Allll of this is a giant mess. And the fightscenes are still super incomprehensible. Skywarp freaking out over his teleportation powers makes me sad :c POOR RUMBLE D: POOR SKYWARP D: god everyone is suffering so much D: Nightbeat gets off on the wrong foot with Cyclonus, as per usual. Poor Rumble just keeps losing siblings today :c annnnnd there galvatron bisects megatron neatly. .... is it just me imagining things or is Soundwave really not doing well? I mean he has that massive sparking arm wound but he sounds more offcenter than that would account for... And one of his cassettes just died... and another one is very seriously wounded... God, poor Soundy. ... I can't remember if they ever solved that whole sleeper agent problem with Nightbeat tbh. Sluuuuuuuug. Poor baby. (Though... i love that.... Arcee and the Dinobots are kidn of friendly with eachother? Apparently? I love all these "outsider" friendships tbh...) Astrotrain has bad eyes. I forgot about that... that's kind of cute SOUNDWAVE KEEPS LOOKING SADDER AND SADDER AND MORE AND MORE SCARED ADN IT'S NOT OKAY. I AM NOT OKAY Ratchetttttt don't talk about punching whiiiiiirl..... God it's... actually so good that Starscream is proving everyone wrong. Like he is actually honestly trying so hard to be a good leader right now and is concerned... this whole thing saddens me. ...tbh OP becoming violent that badly is still worrying. Like even if he's acting. That's massively out of character and it shows a worrying trend. ... I actually still don't know how the fuck Nova is back in the dead universe tbh. It doesn't make sense at all. Unless that's... before he got out? which would be weird. byeeeee hardhead Ahhh yeah this is before Nova and Galvatron jump through Megatron's chest. god the first part of DC is just so long and boring for the most part
Spoiler: LL2 preview I love the worldbuilding we get in that one line: "Had it provided an essential function it would have been born." It reminds me of how people used to ask "they're transformers; why do they need non-transformer transportation and such?" And so the Functionists' answer was: they don't. And now I'm wondering how deep does it go. What kind of tools are allowed, or is everything a born transformer? ARE THE STASIS CUFFS MINIBOTS IN ALT MODE?
Oh nooooooo, you're giving me so many secondhand emotions over dark cybertron :C I really do need to go back and read everything again now that I understand everyone so much better. And I'm flipping through real fast, and oh my god, Starscream's classification override code that he set is "starscream prime, prime one." Even after everything that went down with the matrix! and the asteroid!! and spotlight: megatron!!! Oh my god, baby, I'm so proud of you, but please let someone give you a hug And also Whirl hurts me: "[Cyclonus] and I are very similar, really: two reformed characters struggling to make our way in life." It's funny cause it's truuuuuue ;u; Oh, and Rodimus trying to reassure Ultra Magnus when he's getting left in charge by talking about what a shitty leader he is. Plus the way he orbits Optimus and everything he says around him. I NEED TO STOP, I'M IN PAIN. But just as one last thing, I give you this screenshot of Prowl's luscious lips
Telllll usssssss Also not sure about extended interaction between Whirl and Arcee, per se, but they do strike a nice pose
See, the thing is that Arcee is an angry, merciless killer who wants to fit in better. Whirl is simply trying for Most Unhelpful and often succeeding.
YOU CALL THAT LUSCIOUS!!!! this is a real panel in a real comic published by IDW, god bless us, everyone
OOOH, these are indeed some excellent lips. And his frowny forehead thing is properly proportioned, not a wibbly little afterthought! But I do have to say that dark cybertron prowl's lips look eminently soft and kissable. These lips are crisply outlined, but the dark cybertron lips hold your attention as you watch the light and shadows shift as he talks :3c (ps, combiner wars prowl is giving me some serious emotions, I need to figure out exactly what I want to say, but by god do I have things to say)
did you...have that saved ready just for a moment like this also we need more robot lipstick in general Prowl needs it, Overlord needs it, I swear I saw an edit of the latter once
You underestimate the apple's power....... As far as robot lipstick: Overlord https://outlashting.tumblr.com/post/131043364024 https://outlashting.tumblr.com/post/151486153948/maybe-overlord-with-pale-blue-lipgloss-a-beauty https://outlashting.tumblr.com/post/131575855839 Prowl https://outlashting.tumblr.com/post/130497375388 https://outlashting.tumblr.com/post/130769838853 <THE MOST LUSCIOUS!!! https://outlashting.tumblr.com/post/148164461975/some-exrid-prowl-in-arcees-colours-with-some-make https://outlashting.tumblr.com/post/135207339045 Have I mentioned I love outlashting?
also Spoiler: LL 02 preview i'm pretty sure it's "Quick" and the Q is just badly rendered in the second panel! the full name seems to be "Quickflash of Tesk(?)" and a quick look at the wiki says there's a place called Tesk Crater on cybertron so i think that's right casually tries to read all the names?? Gimmick(?) of Kaon Ice-Vent of Vos Triggerfinger of Ibex Cyclotron of Kalis Snoop of Tarn Zap of Iacon Quickflash of Tesk Bruteforce of Polyhex Analyticus of Tarn Skyhaven of Iacon Shank of Kaon Subcrawler of Teledonia (???) Lookout of Vos (maybe Lockout)?? S----back of Altihex Stump(?) of Kalis (god i hope it's stump) Gauge(?) of Polyhex Static of ---- aaand that's p much all i can make out except for a few that i think say Sandblast, Arcanus, Stomp, Chevron, Outback, Bladefoot, Blocksmasher (??), Mightclaw, Cloudblast, Astroblast, holy shit my eyes are starting to hurt, can't wait to see how wildly inaccurate these are when the HD version is available but anyway anyway anyway the IMPORTANT THING is that lug's a girl too and anode thinks drift and rodimus are conjunx and i have been able to think of nothing else since i learned this
my robot folder contains multitudes. you don't come across a panel like that and not save it for future occasions
I just had a thought, which was: shattered glass TFP with good guy decepticons, Soundwave seems oddly tolerant of humans and their shenanigans, and then someone figures out that, to someone as big as Soundwave is, a human is roughly in the same range of heights as Rumble and Frenzy were.
I know you said TFP, but now I'm just imagining Shattered Glass Soundwave in general just. Picking up humans who are in danger and shoving them in his cassette holder for safe-keeping
IT'S NOT ACTUALLY ALL THAT INTERESTING TO ANYONE WHO ISN'T ME I THINK BUT OKAY basically, if you weren't aware of this, I am the local Unicron apologist. It is me. This may sound very difficult given how little characterization he has and how much of that characterization is "rawr rawr EVIL" Spoiler: holy shit this got long, probably spoilers for a bunch of stuff BUT! in general we get some clues about his powers and what he does if we scrape together most continuities and try to figure out a coherent picture. He is a personification of entropy and chaos, he eats planets, his energon can cause dead frames to become zombies, basically he is the polar opposite to Primus in every way with all those standard devil figure "perversions of God's Design" things going on. Another thing is that in one continuity killing him made a black hole that tried to suck up all of reality. Now it's not exactly hard to attribute almost all of DC to Unicron's influence. Galvatron and Cyclonus are usually key players of Unicron's forces, but instead of being reformatted from Decepticons, in IDW they are independent characters who traversed the Dead Universe, a place with remarkable thematic similarities to Unicron's entire thing. This, funnily, divorces Megatron entirely from Unicron's influence, something that will become very relevant in a bit! So first let's look at that prophecy scoop dragged up. Now Scoop is pretty much entirely certain that this is about Starscream. And the narrative points us fairly unsubtly at Shockwave. The first would go against pretty much all precedent set in earlier continuities, as I mentioned. Starscream does not tend to do well when it comes to Unicron. In fact Unicron's first appearance period coincided with Starscream's brutal annihilation at the hands of Galvatron in the 80s Transformers Cartoon Movie. And furthermore Starscream didn't arrive with the black metal titan. At all. He was pretty much entirely uninvolved with that part. Plus he didn't unmake anything, he's actually a fairly productive and constructive leader so far! So it's really really obvious, if one just really looks at what we have as far as information here goes, that Starscream is not the one this prophecy is about. If anything, he is briefly nodded towards as someone who suffers greatly at the hands of the False Prophet ("And Stars will Scream"). But even Shockwave is not the False Prophet of the prophecy, he is "The Symbol Of The Uncreator" as we are very subtly shown by that symbol looking... exactly like Shockwave's not-face. Given Shockwave's entire plan for DC, it is very clear he is at least far enough aligned with Unicron's whole "consume all of reality, destroy everything, entropy!!!" thing, to really deserve that title too. So who does that leave? Well, Nova Prime, maybe. But he hardly got anywhere with the whole plan and iirc Shockwave kind of kept the whole "lol reality will be destroyed forever" thing from him so that wasn't really something that came from him. But someone else arrived "with the titan". Yknow. The guy who raised that particular titan. Someone who has been shown fairly often in canon to fit the description "[...] and stand alone while not alone" pretty perfectly. The one who is quite possibly a reincarnation of one of the Thirteen Primes. Optimus Prime. Brief detour! Remember how I said it was important that Megatron got really really divorced from his connection to Unicron that he traditionally has? Yeah, see, there's a continuity that involves a lot more Cybertronian Myth than we've gotten for IDW so far, but the parts we got from both have a good chunk of overlap. It's the Aligned Continuity, mainly Transformers Prime. There we get some lore for the Thirteen, mainly, which is the most important part. See in IDW we know that 2 of the Thirteen Primes' names have been lost to history, and they are instead referred to as The Fallen and The Arisen. We have already gotten confirmation of The Fallen being Megatronus and him being the leader of Galvatron's tribe. The Arisen being called Optimus Prime is not exactly farfetched, given that IDW's Thirteen seem to be based on those from Aligned. So that means we can look for clues on more details as to how their era went down in Aligned as well! In one of the novels that belong to the Continuity, The Covenant Of Primus we get for example told that "Discord among the Primes began to build more strongly when Maximo discovered and revealed a chart where Prima had plotted which Primes were the most like Unicron and functioned as "Agents of Chaos." This enraged Megatronus (who had always been secretly ashamed of and at inner war with his own nature). " [x] This hints at Megatronus being unusually close to Unicron due to the contact with him during the great battle. But again I posit that making Galvatron a character different from Megatron and Megatron being clearly against the Chaos-bringer as symbolized by Shockwave during DC means that this connection in IDW has to be at least somewhat different. There has been some theories goign around about the apparent role-reversal between OP and Megatron now that the war is over. and this is very interesting in that light. Because Megatron hardly had contact with Galvatron at all, but afaik Optimus was fairly involved in taht aprt of the plot (I haven't read that far in exrid yet). And Shockwave was a very important part of Optimus' backstory and vice versa. And Optimus is clearly headed in a uh... worrying direction right now. Especially since he has gotten so much confirmation of being A True Prime from every corner despite the fact taht canonically, the Matrix is painful and unpleasant to him, while it is very warm and pleasant to Rodimus. So in conclusion: I think that The Arisen in IDW was at least similarly touched by Unicron's influence, if not more so than Megatronus and that the legend about a "False Prophet" is actually about Optimus Prime.
