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To contribute to the celebrations of the 30th anniversary of the franchise, IDW Publishing are joining in with a very special edition of the very first Transformers comic, from all the way back in 1984! The comic includes an afterword by current editor John Barber, and is available for the amazing price of $1. Check out a full preview of what was the introduction of some of our favourite transforming space robots!

Transformers #1 (1984) Hundred Penny Press Edition
Bill Mantlo & Ralph Macchio (w) • Frank Springer (a) • Bill Sienkiewicz (c)
See how the epic began, for only a buck! Celebrate issue 100 of TRANSFORMERS: REGENERATION ONE with the story that started it all! AUTOBOTS wage their battle to destroy the evil forces of the DECEPTICONS—and their war spills onto Earth!
FC • 32 pages • $1.00

Bullet points:
- Featuring the first appearance of OPTIMUS PRIME, MEGATRON, and many, many more beloved characters!
- Afterword by TRANSFORMERS: ROBOTS IN DISGUISE writer John Barber!

It's been a while since I've read this. Just looking at the pages gives me goosebumps...

Wish I had held on to my Marvel Transformer comics from back in the day. Not the best writing or art, but I will certainly get this for a trip down memory lane.

Seeing this reminds me that comics before the 1990's were super wordy. You really got a lot more read for your 75 cents. Although it isn't in the web preview, there is a page introducing all the Autobots by name and personality, that has to the the longest page of dialog in comics history. For those that don't know, the character names and personalities were created by Marvel writers.

To this day, I'm still not sure what Optimus Prime was supposed to transform into for his Cybertronian alt mode. A tank? A kibble-cannon? A kill-truck? Not sure.

Love that Sienkiewicz cover. Take that, Decepticreep!! Ginormous Optimus Prime schooled you.

Why is a mis-coloured Optimus Prime attacking the Ark in that last page?

Dead Metal wrote:Why is a mis-coloured Optimus Prime attacking the Ark in that last page?

The cartoon had animation errors, the comics had...those.

Dead Metal wrote:Why is a mis-coloured Optimus Prime attacking the Ark in that last page?

Twas only the first issue. It was chock full of all kinds of art errors. Things improved over time, though.

However, it seems IDW tried fixing some coloring errors since that Jazz standing next to Optimus on the page with the Autobot Elder should be miscolored gold instead of white like he is here.

And they blackened Megatron's eyes on the first page instead of leaving them yellowish.

Sabrblade wrote:However, it seems IDW tried fixing some coloring errors since that Jazz standing next to Optimus on the page with the Autobot Elder should be miscolored gold instead of white like he is here.

That was an error? I just always thought that was either Bumblebee or Sunstreaker.

Rodimus Prime wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:However, it seems IDW tried fixing some coloring errors since that Jazz standing next to Optimus on the page with the Autobot Elder should be miscolored gold instead of white like he is here.

That was an error? I just always thought that was either Bumblebee or Sunstreaker.

That body type is definitely Jazz.

Plus, I doubt either Bee or Streaker would have the ranks to appear in a meeting with an Elder as much as Jazz would.

Rodimus Prime wrote:

Dead Metal wrote:Why is a mis-coloured Optimus Prime attacking the Ark in that last page?

The cartoon had animation errors, the comics had...those.

Looking at it again, the other Optimus seems to be using Hound's body.
This is almost as hilarious as the German covers.

I still have my copy of the original. Surprisingly one of the few pristine G1 things I have always had.

I love how extremely toyetic some of these characters are in the first issue. Rumble, Ravage, Jazz, Ironhide, Ratchet...nostalgia at it's best.

Dead Metal wrote:

Rodimus Prime wrote:

Dead Metal wrote:Why is a mis-coloured Optimus Prime attacking the Ark in that last page?

The cartoon had animation errors, the comics had...those.

Looking at it again, the other Optimus seems to be using Hound's body.
This is almost as hilarious as the German covers.

I dont think I've ever seen any German comic covers

sto_vo_kor_2000 wrote:

Dead Metal wrote:

Rodimus Prime wrote:

Dead Metal wrote:Why is a mis-coloured Optimus Prime attacking the Ark in that last page?

The cartoon had animation errors, the comics had...those.

Looking at it again, the other Optimus seems to be using Hound's body.
This is almost as hilarious as the German covers.

I dont think I've ever seen any German comic covers

Click through each issue to feast your eyes on these garish nightmares:

http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Die_Transformer
http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers_Comic-Magazin
http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers_Extra_Comic-Sonderheft
http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers_Super-Auswahlband

All produced by this company - http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Condor_Verlag

Sabrblade wrote:

sto_vo_kor_2000 wrote:

Dead Metal wrote:

Rodimus Prime wrote:

Dead Metal wrote:Why is a mis-coloured Optimus Prime attacking the Ark in that last page?

The cartoon had animation errors, the comics had...those.

Looking at it again, the other Optimus seems to be using Hound's body.
This is almost as hilarious as the German covers.

I dont think I've ever seen any German comic covers

Click through each issue to feast your eyes on these garish nightmares:

http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Die_Transformer
http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers_Comic-Magazin
http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers_Extra_Comic-Sonderheft
http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers_Super-Auswahlband

All produced by this company - http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Condor_Verlag

holy crazy colors Batman

Bounti76 wrote:I love how extremely toyetic some of these characters are in the first issue. Rumble, Ravage, Jazz, Ironhide, Ratchet...nostalgia at it's best.

The first comics certainly had more truth in advertising that the cartoon which came after.

A close second for toy-accurate depictions was issues 33 and 34, which I believe was US comics reader's first introduction to the UK version of Transformers. These were my first Transformers comics and I thought enough of them to keep them for 25 years.

spiderbob007 wrote:

Bounti76 wrote:I love how extremely toyetic some of these characters are in the first issue. Rumble, Ravage, Jazz, Ironhide, Ratchet...nostalgia at it's best.

The first comics certainly had more truth in advertising that the cartoon which came after.

A close second for toy-accurate depictions was issues 33 and 34, which I believe was US comics reader's first introduction to the UK version of Transformers. These were my first Transformers comics and I thought enough of them to keep them for 25 years.

I still have this issue!! I just read it a couple of weeks ago, and you're right- Mirage especially looks like his toy here.

I just realized that the robot on the cover of issue 33 is a red and blue Megatron without his fusion cannon.

I love the composition of this cover, too bad Charles Vess doesn't do much comic work anymore.

From what I remember from the farewell written at the end of the "Final" issue, the first issue, just shortly before going to press. Was basically scrapped, and started again from scratch. So it was basically a rush job to get it in on its release date. So I'm not surprised it looked a little on the rough side.

Lord Manhammer '74 wrote:From what I remember from the farewell written at the end of the "Final" issue, the first issue, just shortly before going to press. Was basically scrapped, and started again from scratch. So it was basically a rush job to get it in on its release date. So I'm not surprised it looked a little on the rough side.

I stopped reading The Transformers comics long before issue #80, and had not read that story. I'm sure "the powers that were" translates as Jim Shooter. He had a reputation in the industry for making last-minute changes.



Thanks for the insight.

I just recently ordered 'Transformers Classic Volume 1' which includes the first 13 issues of the 80s series. I'm really looking forward to reading it. Transformers was the first comic I ever got as a kid. But I sold my 80s TF comics years ago.

spiderbob007 wrote:

Lord Manhammer '74 wrote:From what I remember from the farewell written at the end of the "Final" issue, the first issue, just shortly before going to press. Was basically scrapped, and started again from scratch. So it was basically a rush job to get it in on its release date. So I'm not surprised it looked a little on the rough side.

I stopped reading The Transformers comics long before issue #80, and had not read that story. I'm sure "the powers that were" translates as Jim Shooter. He had a reputation in the industry for making last-minute changes.



Thanks for the insight.

I have never read that before. That's pretty fascinating.