The Energon Pub

News Credits: 1350 · by **ZeroWolf** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 4:43 am

Taste is pretty much subjective, personally, I love his art as well.

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 9:09 am

Indeed. While at the same time, just because you like something, doesn't mean it's good. Especially when it comes to this art on an objective level.

News Credits: 1350 · by **ZeroWolf** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 10:15 am

AllNewSuperRobot wrote:Indeed. While at the same time, just because you like something, doesn't mean it's good. Especially when it comes to this art on an objective level.

Even then I doubt you'll get consensus. I mean, look at modern art, or something I recently learned about in the NFT thread, invisible art. You may not care for this style but it doesn't make it bad. It just means it doesn't do anything for you. The ultimate decider on the art will be when IDW look at sales data, which will be very soon.

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 10:24 am

ZeroWolf wrote:
AllNewSuperRobot wrote:Indeed. While at the same time, just because you like something, doesn't mean it's good. Especially when it comes to this art on an objective level.
You may not care for this style but it doesn't make it bad.

As I said, objectively, this art is bad. In terms of panelling, composition, anatomy, scaling, perspective etc IE All the important arty-farty bits a professional should be trained in. Even genuinely stylised comic book art at least follows the basics.

News Credits: 1350 · by **ZeroWolf** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 11:16 am

I'm pretty sure IDW themselves would disagree with that.

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 11:31 am

I doubt that. The general metric for the talent of the last few years seems either inexperienced and/or cheap.

News Credits: 1 · by **bluecatcinema** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 2:02 pm

I like how Blackarachnia isn't open to taking any lip from Terrorsaur.

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 2:10 pm

It reminded me of how much more interesting a character Blackarachnia was, in Season One. Before she was diluted into "love interest".

News Credits: 4838 · by **william-james88** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 2:54 pm

This art aint got nothing on John Romita Jr

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 2:57 pm

william-james88 wrote:This art aint got nothing on John Romita Jr

Given their output since IDWverse 2.0, ironically I imagine even JRJR and Rob Liefeld are likely out of IDW's price range :lol:

News Credits: 456 · by **Sabrblade** » Wed Oct 27, 2021 5:55 pm

AllNewSuperRobot wrote:JRJR

Jar Jar?

News Credits: 456 · by **Sabrblade** » Fri Oct 29, 2021 2:18 pm

Just read #9. An interesting character piece. Razorbeast is very likable and I'm very glad that he was not killed off. Hope to see more of him interacting with more of the main cast in forthcoming issues.

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Thu Nov 04, 2021 1:45 pm

Yep, as something new, I liked the approach to Razorbeast in this issue. Unlike the return of the Graffiti Vok.
I assume Razorbeast was part of the BW2/Neo series. But I only previously knew of him in media from The Gathering/Ascending (wherein he seemed a bit too generic).

If this series does end in 12 issues, however. The main positive for me would be that Skold and Nyx are cast into obscurity, toyless, where they belong.

Once more, on the art front...

It is so sad we go from this sublime cover art by Alex Milne :

To, perhaps the worst Beast Mode so far...

Perspective? Hello?

News Credits: 456 · by **Sabrblade** » Thu Nov 04, 2021 1:57 pm

AllNewSuperRobot wrote:I assume Razorbeast was part of the BW2/Neo series.

He was a Wave 1 Hasbro toy.

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Thu Nov 04, 2021 2:00 pm

Sabrblade wrote:
AllNewSuperRobot wrote:I assume Razorbeast was part of the BW2/Neo series.
He was a Wave 1 Hasbro toy.

I assumed he was part of the BW2/Neo series, based on his prevalence and importance in The Gathering/Ascending. I had the original figure.

News Credits: 456 · by **Sabrblade** » Thu Nov 04, 2021 2:10 pm

AllNewSuperRobot wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:
AllNewSuperRobot wrote:I assume Razorbeast was part of the BW2/Neo series.
He was a Wave 1 Hasbro toy.

I assumed he was part of the BW2/Neo series, based on his prevalence and importance in The Gathering/Ascending. I had the original figure.

His importance in those comics was purely Furman picking some non-show character and making them important, like what he did for Thunderwing and Bludgeon back in Marvel G1. It's a thing that Furman was known for doing.

While yes, his toy was released in Japan redecoed in gold as the Beast Wars Neo character Randy (one of the most notorious, self-destructive victims of GPS ever), but he was only ever a single-episode guest star and very one-dimensional. 99% of the Western fandom hadn't even seen Randy's episode (let alone the majority of either JBW cartoon) back when The Gathering/Ascending came out. Nobody gives a hoot about Randy as a character.

News Credits: 4838 · by **william-james88** » Thu Nov 04, 2021 2:10 pm

Sabrblade wrote:
AllNewSuperRobot wrote:I assume Razorbeast was part of the BW2/Neo series.
He was a Wave 1 Hasbro toy.

I thought the op was referring to the fictional appearance of th character, not the toy

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Thu Nov 04, 2021 2:24 pm

Sabrblade wrote:His importance in those comics was purely Furman picking some non-show character and making them important, like what he did for Thunderwing and Bludgeon back in Marvel G1. It's a thing that Furman was known for doing.

While yes, his toy was released in Japan redecoed in gold as the Beast Wars Neo character Randy (one of the most notorious, self-destructive victims of GPS ever), but he was only ever a single-episode guest star and very one-dimensional. 99% of the Western fandom hadn't even seen Randy's episode (let alone the majority of either JBW cartoon) back when The Gathering/Ascending came out. Nobody gives a hoot about Randy as a character.

All these years and I assumed Razorbeast featured because he meant something to the Japanese series. Furman's character choices for The Gathering/Ascending continue to be infuriating... :BANG_HEAD:

News Credits: 456 · by **Sabrblade** » Thu Nov 04, 2021 2:32 pm

AllNewSuperRobot wrote:All these years and I assumed Razorbeast featured because he meant something to the Japanese series. Furman's character choices for The Gathering/Ascending continue to be infuriating...

Japan mainly only cares about Lio Convoy when it comes to the JBW-original characters.

As for Furman, it's just what he did in Transformers fiction. Take nobodies and try to turn them into somebodies.

Well, that, and give spotlight to Grimlock. He loves Grimlock (crafty comics Grimlock, not dumb caveman cartoon Grimlock).

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Thu Nov 04, 2021 2:37 pm

Oh yeah, Furman has always had his favourites. From the Part Work, I know he couldn't think higher of Grimlock or Galvatron in the Marvel run. To a lesser extent in the -Ations run too.

As per The Gathering/Ascending, there were so many (relegated to visual cameos) that would have been more interesting to use than a Warthog... Sigh

News Credits: 1350 · by **ZeroWolf** » Sun Nov 21, 2021 11:52 am

So Beast Wars must have sold well, it's going past #12. Good that it's succeeded.

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Sun Nov 21, 2021 11:55 am

Hopefully involving a creative team change.

News Credits: 1350 · by **ZeroWolf** » Sun Nov 21, 2021 1:40 pm

Nope, same team. IDW probably don't see a reason to mix up the staff if sales are strong

News Credits: 6 · by **AllNewSuperRobot** » Mon Nov 22, 2021 10:20 am

ZeroWolf wrote:Nope, same team. IDW probably don't see a reason to mix up the staff if sales are strong

Assuming that is mutually exclusive. Transformers as a franchise has often fell foul of people buying into anything, just to cater to their nostalgia.
Sales don't equate quality, just how many buy it.

I recently thinned out my single issue collection. Among the cull, was IDW's awful Unicron mini series and, aptly, this entire series to date. I read them through once, when they arrive and that's it. As I see no value in them, I dropped them off at a local charity shop.

News Credits: 456 · by **Sabrblade** » Fri Nov 26, 2021 1:33 am

AllNewSuperRobot wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:His importance in those comics was purely Furman picking some non-show character and making them important, like what he did for Thunderwing and Bludgeon back in Marvel G1. It's a thing that Furman was known for doing.

While yes, his toy was released in Japan redecoed in gold as the Beast Wars Neo character Randy (one of the most notorious, self-destructive victims of GPS ever), but he was only ever a single-episode guest star and very one-dimensional. 99% of the Western fandom hadn't even seen Randy's episode (let alone the majority of either JBW cartoon) back when The Gathering/Ascending came out. Nobody gives a hoot about Randy as a character.

All these years and I assumed Razorbeast featured because he meant something to the Japanese series. Furman's character choices for The Gathering/Ascending continue to be infuriating...

This is why Furman chose Razorbeast:

Razorbeast was more of a handy blank slate, onto which I could write a character. I already had the idea for ‘The Pack,’ a sort of covert Maximal Mission Impossible team, so it was matter of finding a suitable ‘agent.’ Razorbeast’s name (and the fact that he was one of the first BW toy releases in the US) kind of stood out for me, though I’m glad I didn’t actually see the toy (physically) until later. It might have put me off him.

He liked the name, without ever knowing what he looked like beforehand.