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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 Regeneration One: King of Shadows
Reviewed by Blackjack

Issue Review

I spared no moment to rue his passing.
As a nice little two-page prose that fit at the end of #100, I thought that it was nicely written, reads quickly and is a nice little side-story to tell about what exactly happened to everyone else on Cybertron – they died. Ravage’s constant struggles with how the Shadows, where he used to be the most comfortable in, have become alien and filled with enemies. Throughout the short, dense prose, Ravage’s character as unyielding and honourable of sorts is well defined, and it’s nice to see Ravage get some actual characterization instead of just being an attack cat. Ravage also lampshades how idiotic it is that Starscream and Shockwave suddenly became good and preaches unity to people, and he remains the one last true bastion of Decepticon ideals. Maybe serving as a sly nod to Beast Wars, the story serves as a nice little closure with a vague stinger that certainly feels a lot better than the actual finale.

Notes

The entire events of this short story take place off-screen throughout #99 and #100, and details the fates of everyone on Cybertron – basically everyone is dead.

This story also marks the first time that the cassettes Overkill, Slugfest, Beastbox, Squawktalk and the E-Hobby exclusive toy Howlback has ever been mentioned in the Marvel continuity. (Garboil is the only on to be missing)

The idea of Ravage as the only believer of the Decepticon cause in an unfamiliar culture seems to bring in mind how in the Beast Wars cartoon, Ravage was the only Decepticon left in a society filled with their descendants, Maximals and Predacons, and even then still believes in Megatron’s ideal.

Goofs

The story makes constant reference to the cassettes being symbiotic to Soundwave, even though that’s not really a thing in the Marvel comics where other than shooting Laserbeak out a couple of times, most of the other cassettes are shown to be independent of Soundwave.

Nominally, Howlback is a female, even though I’m not quite sure how that will work out in the Marvel continuity. Is she just female just because, or is she genderless like everyone else in this continuity? I don't care.

 
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