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Hi all,

Been out of the Transformers Loop for quite a while. I really want to start collecting the IDW transformers series, but with it being so far in to the series now, if there any collections that can bring me up to speed or anything that I essentially need to read first?

The last Transformers comics I read were when Dreamwave were running the show with my last comic being the Galvatron Variant Issue 0 of the ongoing series.

Any help would be awesome

Here you go, The List so far.
(I'm still working on placing MTMTE #39-42, but ignore that for now.)

I. The Beginning…
1. Megatron Origin
2. Spotlight - Orion Pax
3. Spotlight – Blur (All Hail Megatron Vol. 3 p. 4)
4. Autocracy
5. Monstrosity
6. Primacy in 2014
7. Spotlight - Thundercracker

II. The Spotlights
8. Spotlight – Shockwave (Spotlight Vol. 1 p. 9)
9. Spotlight – Cliffjumper (All Hail Megatron Vol. 3 p. 52)
10. Spotlight – Soundwave (Spotlight Vol. 2 p. 9)
11. Spotlight – Wheelie (Spotlight Vol. 3 p. 100)
12. Spotlight - Hot Rod (Spotlight Vol. 1. p. 50)
13. Spotlight – Sixshot (Spotlight Vol. 1 p. 73)
14. Spotlight -- Ultra Magnus (Spotlight Vol. 1 p. 96)

III. Present Day Earth
15. Infiltration #0-3 (through p. 86)
16. Stormbringer #1-3
17. Infiltration #4-5 (p. 87-132)
18. Stormbringer #4 (Full page panel of Thunderwing in jet mode)
19. Infiltration #6 (p. 133 to end)
20. Spotlight – Kup (Spotlight Vol. 2 p. 28)
21. Escalation #1-2 (through p. 46)
22. Spotlight – Nightbeat (Spotlight Vol. 1 p. 27)
23. Escalation #3-6 (p. 47 to end)
24. Spotlight – Ramjet (Spotlight Vol. 2 p. 100)
25. Spotlight - Optimus Prime (Spotlight Vol. 2 p. 76)
26. Spotlight – Galvatron (Spotlight Vol. 2 p. 52)
27. Devastation #1-4 (pages unnumbered; Chapter 4 ends with close-up of Starscream talking to Astrotrain)
28. Spotlight – Blaster (Spotlight Vol. 3 p. 4)
29. Spotlight – Arcee (Spotlight Vol. 3 p. 28)
30. Devastation #5-6 (pages unnumbered; Chapter 5 begins with “Cybertron-The Past”)
31. Spotlight – Mirage (Spotlight Vol. 3 p. 76)
32. Spotlight – Grimlock (Spotlight Vol. 3 p. 52)
33. Spotlight Volume 4 – Revelation
34. Maximum Dinobots

IV. All Hail Megatron!
35. All Hail Megatron Vol. 2 Chapter 2 p. 1
36. All Hail Megatron Vol. 2 Chapter 1 p. 3-13, 17-19
37. All Hail Megatron Volume 4: “Everything In Its Right Place”
38. Spotlight – Drift (All Hail Megatron Vol. 3 p. 76)
39. Spotlight – Metroplex (All Hail Megatron Vol. 3 p. 100)
40. All Hail Megatron Volume 4: “Lost And Found”
41. Spotlight- Jazz (All Hail Megatron Vol. 3 p. 28)
42. All Hail Megatron Volume 1-2 in full
(Note: All Hail Megatron Volume 4 has #43-#48)
43. “Old Ways” Optimus/Ironhide
44. “Uneasy Lies The Head” Starscream
45. “Replay” Sunstreaker
46. “Rebirth” Galvatron/Cyclonus/Scourge
47. “The Man Of Steel” Spike
48. “Hidden” Bumblebee

V. Three Years Later (Note: #50-#58, #68-#72 are located in Last Stand Of The Wreckers Hardcover)
49. Spotlight- Prowl (Ongoing Vol. 6)
50. Autobot File: Rotorstorm p. 130
51. Autobot File: Pyro p. 131
52. Autobot File: Guzzle p. 132
53. Autobot File: Ironfist p. 133
54. Autobot File: Impactor p. 134
55. Decepticon File: Snare p. 135
56. Decepticon File: Overlord p. 136
57. Squadron X p. 161
58. BULLETS/OUT OF BULLETS: Deleted Scenes p. 116 - 128 except ‘Nine Months Later’
59. Last Stand Of The Wreckers #1
60. Ongoing Vol. 1 For All Mankind #1
61. Last Stand Of The Wreckers 2-3
62. Ongoing Vol. 1 #2
63. Last Stand Of The Wreckers 4
64. Ongoing Vol. 1 #3-4
65. Bumblebee paperback
66. Ongoing Vol. 1 #5-6
67. Last Stand Of The Wreckers 5
68. ESCAPE p. 162
69. ZERO POINT p. 170
70. IN WORD AND DEED p. 175
71. BULLETS: Nine Months Later p. 125
72. Wreckers Mosaic Dead Man’s Boots p. 129
73. Ironhide paperback
74. Drift paperback
75. Ongoing Vol. 2 International Incident (#7-#8)
76. Ongoing Vol. 4 Heart Of Darkness.“The Road To CHAOS”. Infestation occurs towards end of #4. End of #4 lines up with end of Ongoing #20 in Ongoing Vol. 5: Chaos Theory.
77. Infestation Transformers 1-2
80. Ongoing Vol. 2 #9 to #12
81. Ongoing Vol. 3 Revenge of the Decepticons #13
82. Spotlight - Megatron
83. Ongoing Vol. 3 remainder of Revenge Of The Decepticons
84. Ongoing Vol. 5 Chaos Theory through end of Police Action: Prolog
85. Spotlight - Bumblebee
86. Ongoing Vol. 6 Police Action
87. Ongoing Vol. 5 remainder of Chaos Theory
88. Ongoing Vol. 7 CHAOS
89. Death Of Optimus Prime (More Than Meets The Eye Vol. 1)

VI. The Autobots Divide
90. More Than Meets The Eye Ongoing #1 with Rodimus (Vol. 1)
91. Robots In Disguise Ongoing #1 with Bumblebee (Vol. 1)
92. MTMTE #2-3 (Vol. 1)
93. RID #2-3 (Vol. 1)
94. MTMTE #4-5 (Vol. 2)
95. RID #4-5 (Vol. 1)
96. Spotlight – Trailcutter(Trailbreaker renamed)
97. Spotlight – Hoist
98. More Than Meets the Eye #6 (Vol. 2)
99. More Than Meets the Eye Annual 2012 (Vol. 3)
100. More Than Meets the Eye #7-8 (Vol. 2)
101. Robots in Disguise #6-10 (Vol. 2, 3)
102. More Than Meets the Eye #9-13 (Vol. 3, 4) and text story “A Signal To Noise” (Vol. 4)
103. Robots in Disguise Annual 2012 (Vol. 3)
104. Robots in Disguise #11-16 (Vol. 3, 4)
105. More Than Meets the Eye #14-15 (Vol. 4)
106. Robots in Disguise #17-20 (Vol.5)
107. More Than Meets the Eye #16-21 (Vol. 4, 5) and text story “The Sound Of Breaking Glass” (Vol. 5)
108. Robots in Disguise #21-22 (Vol. 5)
109. More Than Meets the Eye #22 (Vol. 5)

VII. Dark Cybertron
110. Dark Cybertron (Voll. 1-2)

VIII. Dawn of the Autobots
111. Robots in Disguise #28-32
112. More Than Meets the Eye #28-34
113. Windblade #1-4
114. Robots in Disguise #33-34
115. Drift: Empire of Stone

IX. Days of Deception
116. The Transformers #35-38
117. More Than Meets the Eye #35-38
118. Transformers: Punishment

Xa. Combiner Wars
118. The Transformers #39
119. Windblade #1
120. The Transformers #40
121. Windblade #2
122. The Transformers #41
123. Windblade #3
124. The Transformers #42
125. Windblade #4

Xb. ??
126. More Than Meets the Eye #39-42

Thank you so much Dude - Got some reading to do

This makes a pretty good check list too.

If you want to jump into the current ongoings, you could just start with Last Stand of the Wreckers, and then move straight into More Than Meets the Eye and Robots in Disguise (now just "Transformers"), picking up Windblade along the way. The stuff prior to that can be pretty uneven, and is not strictly necessary to read in order to enjoy the current books.

We should maybe sticky one of these threads for once. I mean we get this question at least one a month, and at least once a month Va'al has to copy paste his list, or someone posts a link to the wiki list.

For acquiring physical copies of the comics that came out before 2012, the following IDW Hardcover collections are your best friend:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1600106676/
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1600107516/
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1600108563/
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1600109381/
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1613770529/
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1613771835/
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1613774060/
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1613776276/

As is this hardcover volume of "Last Stand of the Wreckers", as it contains stories not found anywhere else: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1613771266/

As for a reading order, I HIGHLY recommend that the stories be read in as close to publication order as possible, but not in exact publication order since there's too much overlap with several mini-series.

Therefore, I recommend the following reading order for all this pre-2012 stuff, which uses publication order as a base, but is modified to prevent too much overlap and keeps the story mostly going in a smooth enough path, with any stories set in the past instead of the present being treated as "flashbacks" that pause the main story to let these past stories be told along with the present ones.

And everything listed below can be found in the above-linked hardcover volumes, except for "Spotlight: Megatron" and "Spotlight: Bumblebee", which were both written after all of rest was. However, reading them in any other places than where they are listed below has them make less sense than they're supposed to, so those two are the only post-2012 ones to be read with the pre-2012 stuff (so you'd have to track them down in addition to the volumes linked above, but that shouldn't be too hard).

Simon Furman era:
Infiltation
Spotlight: Shockwave
Stormbringer
Spotlight: Nightbeat
Spotlight: Hot Rod
Spotlight: Sixshot
Spotlight: Ultra Magnus
Spotlight: Soundwave
Escalation #1
New Avengers/Transformers
Escalation #2-6
Spotlight: Ramjet
Spotlight: Kup
Spotlight: Galvatron
Spotlight: Optimus Prime
Spotlight: Wheelie
Spotlight: Blaster
Devastation #1-4
Spotlight: Arcee
Devastation #5-6
Spotlight: Grimlock
Revelation
Maximum Dinobots
Spotlight: Mirage
Megatron Origin

Shane McCarthy era (All Hail Megatron):
Spotlight: Blurr
Spotlight: Cliffjumper
Spotlight: Metroplex
All Hail Megatron #1
Spotlight Jazz
All Hail Megatron #2-14
All Hail Megatron #15 Part 1
Spotlight: Drift
All Hail Megatron #15 Part 2
All Hail Megatron #16

Mike Costa era
Ongoing #1-3 ("Things Fall Apart")
Bumblebee
Ongoing #4-6 ("Things Fall Apart")
Spotlight: Prowl
"Dead Men's Boots" Mosaic
Last Stand of the Wreckers
Last Stand of the Wreckers bonus content from the 2012 Hardcover collection:

"Bullets"
"Out of Bullets"
Character Profiles
Series Covers
Script Extracts
Guest Artwork
Squadron X
"Escape"
Promotional Artwork
Fisitron's Facts
Pin-Ups
First Draft
"Zero Point"
"In Word and Deed"

Ongoing #7-8
Ironhide
Drift
Infestation
Ongoing #9-13 ("International Incident")
Spotlight: Megatron
Ongoing #14-18 ("Revenge of the Decepticons")
Ongoing #19-20 ("Space Opera" Parts 1-2)
Heart of Darkness
Ongoing #21-23 ("Space Opera" Part 3 and "Chaos Theory")
Ongoing #25, 27, 29 ("Police Action")
Spotlight: Bumblebee
Ongoing #24, 26, 28, 30, 31 ("Chaos" & "Pax Cybertronia")

As for the comics that came out during and after 2012, I haven't yet gotten around to creating a recommended reading order for them yet.

Because that is wildly different to the list I keep posting every time.

Va'al wrote:Because that is wildly different to the list I keep posting every time.

I keep posting mine because there is no one single best way to read the IDW comics. Your list is in chronological order while mine tries for an order closer to publication order (but is lacking an order for the Roberts/Barber/Scott era stuff since I haven't gotten to arranging those yet).

Sure.

Is this list going to get updated?