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THE TRANSFORMERS: COMICS, BOOKS AND MANGA

Marvel Comics
(1984-1994)
Japanese
Manga
Other Books
and Titles
Titan Books
(2001-2010)
Club/Con
(2001-2016)
Dreamwave
(2002-2004)
Devil's Due
(2003-2007)
IDW Publishing
(2005-now)

CURRENT TRANSFORMERS COMICS FROM IDW PUBLISHING

Transformers: Dark of the Moon Adaptation #3
Reviewed by Blackjack

Issue Review

"I told them whom to trust and I was wrong."
Rather adequate, but still very messy, not help by the ugly, blotched art. Moreno can’t draw humans, and can’t draw proper Transformers. Sentinel’s face constantly looks like it’s molded out of play-doh, and Lennox’s face at one point looks like a chibi manga thing. The dialogue not lifted from the movie is again abysmal, and really, someone who hasn’t watched the movie and bought this would be wondering what the hell does people see in this. Things are bland and rushed, and unlike the previous two issues doesn’t look like Barber put any of his usual effort into doing this.

Differences from the movie

Scenes cut from the movie include Optimus arriving in the NEST base, Sam’s meeting with his parents, the plane scene between Sam and Mearing and the farewell between Sam and Bumblebee.

A scene cut from the final movie (well, it appeared in both adaptations, so presumably it was in the script) was the Twins’ death. Skids leapt to stop Sentinel from shooting Bumblebee, and Mudflap charges into avenge Skids’ death, only to be executed by Sentinel. Sentinel then mocks how the Twins are revolting, which is different from the novel version where Sentinel actually praises the Twins’ heroic sacrifice.

Simmons does not become wheelchair-bound, and indeed recovers immediately after the Dread attack, arriving to see Sentinel blowing Ironhide up.

The movie itself does not show much of NEST when Sentinel activates the Washington space bridge, but here the six remaining Autobots (sans Wheeljack), Lennox and Sam all have scenes in Washington, including Sam running away to warn Carly. Also, instead of Sentinel sparing Optimus, Lennox and Bumblebee fire on Sentinel to drive him off. The Autobots also have a lot of Protoform-hacking scenes.

The Washington scene now happens in the day instead of the night.

Laserbeak is present at Dylan Gould’s house and accompanies Soundwave in stopping Sam and Carly. Instead of threatening to perforate Carly while she is trapped inside him, Soundwave transforms into robot mode and threatens to squish her with his hands.

Sentinel asks the humans to provide them with materials like metals. Barricade is seen on a screen in Sentinel’s video.

Instead of flying in from space, Starscream takes off from nearby the flight base, which really doesn’t make sense.

IDW additions

Sentinel’s eyes turn red from this issue onward. Also, when executing Ironhide and the Twins Sentinel is much more callous and evil-sounding, just like any run-of-the-mill villain.

Megatron states that Starscream has brief knowledge of Space Bridge technology during his reign as ‘Lord of Cybertron’, referring to the events of Reign of Starscream where an ‘experimental Space Bridge’ was used in the plot.

Starscream refers to the fact that he shot down the Ark during Cybertron, seen in Foundation.

In his monologue Optimus refers to some meetings with Sentinel in Foundation, most particularly ‘fate rarely calls upon us at a moment of our choosing’, a line quoted from Revenge of the Fallen.

Sam mentions that Epps left NEST for a consulting gig, something that happened in Rising Storm. It turns out, the consulting gig is simply consulting for NEST, a.k.a. helping to keep the Wreckers in line.

Goofs

On the first page, both Wheelie and Mudflap are messed up. Sentinel’s face on the first two or three pages also fluctuates wildly.

Skids’ gold tooth is painted gray on the fourth panel of the second page.

On the fifth page, Wheelie is again coloured without blue.

As Starscream and Megatron arrived to rendezvous with Sentinel in Washington, there is a second unidentifiable robot next to Sentinel. This disappears after that one frame.

The length of Megatron’s tarp-cape varies from panel to panel.

The Decepticon army alternate between being colourful to a mass of gray.

The tube-top part of Carly’s dress alternate between covering all of her cleavage to ending just below it, to disappearing completely in the second-last page.

The Wreckers are constantly coloured like each other. On the first page, Topspin is coloured like Leadfoot, Roadbuster is coloured like Topspin and Leadfoot is coloured like Roadbuster. On the second panel, that’s a badly drawn Leadfoot’s face, and on the third panel Roadbuster is speaking, but both are coloured in Topspin’s colour scheme.

 
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