THE TRANSFORMERS: COMICS, BOOKS AND MANGA

TRANSFORMERS TITLES FROM TITAN BOOKS / MAGAZINES

Titan Transformers Animated #3
Reviewed by Inflatable Dalek

The situation seems perfect for a Animated story, machines gone wild leading to lots of wacky slapstick. Oddly the strip sidesteps this potential apart from a page of traffic lights misbehaving and goes for a dull super villain and vague Starscream and Afterburner plots that are as interesting as white noise.

A shame because the art has potential and Etherington can at least create the right amount of plot for a 11 page story -- but the Animated comic is ultimately only going to be remembered for its short life, rather than anything in it.


And so it ends, at three issues this is the shortest lasting ongoing Transformers comic. In fact, even counting limited series only Black Horizon and the second Dreamwave G.I. Joe crossover managed fewer issues with two and one respectively, and for the former they were both double sized. The cancellation was so sudden issue 4 is still promoted on the back page. Ultimately the three strips in various stages of development would find a home in the movie comic across issue 23-25, the first two of which resolve the Afterburner subplot.

As to why the comic did so badly when the film comic has managed to keep going despite a sharp dip in readership between films, there are several likely reasons. Firstly the Animated cartoon is relatively obscure in the UK, only showing on minor cable channel with minimal viewers, so effectively there are no pre-existing fans of the show to carry the title. Equally, the bulk of the movie comic’s target audience of pre-teenage boys would probably find the Animated franchise in general and the comic in particular a bit childish resulting in very little crossover between the two. And unlike the film comic where there’s a new movie every few years to give sales a huge push upwards there was nothing to stop a downward spiral for Animated once it started.

It also likely didn’t help that the strips were basically all a bit dull with little feeling for the show.

Professor Sumdac makes his only appearance in the comic as part of a flashback.


Sari appears as a toddler in the flashback sequence. Though it’s possible this is part of whatever false memories given to her to make her think she’s “real” that’s hellish impressive of the Professor to base them on obscure and unimportant events that actually happened.


A Cybertron Decoder Watch, for use with one of the features inside the issue.


Starscreamers;
Search for the Allspark competition,
Bits and Bots (drawn by Lee Bradley);
Character Puzzles: BlackArachnia;
Nano-Bites with Professor Sumdac Explains;
Code Cracker, use the free gift to translate secret messages;
Challenge Ratchet;
Competitions for season one of Doctor Who spin off The Sarah Jane Adventures and some Astrosaurs books;
Professor Sumdac’s Design A ’Bot, a art page;
BlackArachnia poster;
How to Draw… Bulkhead,
Prime Vs. Megatron, guide to a simple dice game kids can play;
Bee Mail with special guest star Prowl.
[It’s of course impossible to tell how many of the new features were supposed to be ongoing or just one-offs.]

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