Spoiler: taao 8 Those... those horns are jointed. They're articulated. Dark IDW, show me the forbidden alien body language
Spoiler: TAAO 8 I really wanna know his deal bc... all we know so far is that he manipulated the other Primes into starting the first civil war and thus is TOTALLY JUDAS THE WORST PERSON EVER. But... that happened SO long ago and every account of it that's not from a contemporary is super twisted in some way and contemporary accounts are still muddled by what the person knew at the time and learned since and their own biases and shitty memory and everything. I'm not going to say Liege Maximo did nothing wrong, but I highly suspect there's More Than Meets The Eye (tm) going on here. Besides, if you can be manipulated into... trying to kill your significant other? Doing something so bad to them you fracture you entire species into warring factions? WHATEVER actually happened between Megatronus and Solus?? then there's deeper problems in the relationship and the wider network of relationships already, and I doubt Liege Maximo is solely responsible for all that. Basically, the closest thing we know to be true right now is that Liege Maximo manipulated Megatronus into taking the actions that set off the civil war, but that doesn't necessarily mean all the blame shifts from Megatronus to Liege Maximo, because there's a ton we don't know.
Spoiler: TAAO 8 What I'm saying is that Liege Maximo is the sole cause for the Autobot/Decepticon war, he killed all of Chromedome's dead conjunxes, he pushed Tailgate into that hole, and he is a known pusher of curly straws. Meme Maximo.
Spoiler: taao 8 If I'm ever going to write up a list of my favorite favorite candidates for a modern 13 primes, I think Starscream is my current frontrunner for Liege Maximo 2.0, which says a lot about my hopes for this character, hahaha. My choice would either be him or Getaway, but I don't want Getaway to have nice things and do want Starscream do have nice things, and even Getaway has reasons for doing the bad shit he did. I don't have JRO here to throw all my faith on, but this series has been so wonderful about giving depth to nominally unsympathetic characters, even ones like Overlord or Pharma. I'm hoping that's part of the editorial push across the comics front. It would be such a waste to have this character and not do delicious, nuanced things with him.
Okay but going back into old issues and photoshopping him into historical scenes a la John Egbert-- I might have a new silly project
Spoiler: Meme Maximo I think the thing you're forgetting is that Liege Maximo gave Cyclonus a really good recommendation letter for his job interview with Galvatron, raised Overlord up from a one percenter protoform, and trolled Megatron on a poetry forum.
Spoiler: TAAO 8 WAIT NO PROWL as Liege Maximo. Charming, analytical, manipulative, absolutely burning with conviction for the greater good, juggling more schemes than he can handle, burning with the desire to protect his friends, his world, his ex-boyfriend, his faction, only to end up over his head and up to his arms in energon, regretting that, pulling back, but then seeing a need, stepping forward to fill it because nobody else can, and it all just keeps burning up and falling down around his ears. He'll burn the world for a brighter future and end up confused when he's left with a handful of ashes.
!!!!!!! Well. Barring future jossing, that minor character's personality has clicked in my head and I now regard him with worrying amounts of devotion. Indifference to adoration in two seconds flat. (oh my god, though, imagine prowl and starscream's horrible, time-displaced lovechild. that's his origin story now, I don't make the rules)
For @Verily and anyone else who wanted to know what the "Coffee Achiever" lyric meant in this thread's namesake song, here it is:
I found more info and you aren't far off https://marketingsmartaleck.wordpress.com/2014/06/09/retroanalysis-the-coffee-achievers/
Hey, hey, guys, speaking of my new favorite, it's not canon, BUT Spoiler: taao 8 Okay, one, TRAGIC!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Two, female holoavatar who inspired the myth of Aphrodite, AAAAAAAAAA Three, this is basically Loki as a giant robot, plus with extra drama, so EVEN BETTER (I am still loving prowl for him, but god am I really feeling starscream) And finally..... this business with Liege Maximo, Solus, Prima and "bonding" them together. I don't know exactly what that means, but that sounds SUSPICIOUSLY similar to the fake marriage trope. It says drama and further conflict up there, and "interesting times", but what I am hearing is uncontrollable amounts of sexual tension.
Spoiler: mtmte 49, large Oh my god, look at Tarn's shoulder treads waving dramatically like a cape in the not-wind of his office, look at the dramatic underlighting on the corpses nailed to his walls, WHAT A DORK
Spoiler Meanwhile Skids is trying so hard to remain optimistic in the living hell his life is now and cling to the little victories such as getting Quark out, because that's the way he can cope with what's happening and still feel like he has some measure of control over his life. ...and that's about to go really, really badly for him and basically break him emotionally SO hard he dies of it later, OF THE PURE EMOTIONS.
I'm doing a softer world edits right now, and I blew through that issue looking for some prime getaway content, but then I was all SIGH, because the skids comic I did from that issue was so perfect, it's almost impossible to top. But! I have also edited the text out of some REALLY gr8 panels as I went and now I'm looking for places to use them, and this game isn't as good as writing all the fics jamming my head would be, but it's still a whole lot of fun
I had to do significant editing to get the word balloons out of all three of those pictures But it was completely worth it :3c