The Good WarA Review of
Transformers: Lost Light #17Generally Spoiler-Free
Hey, that's not the name of the series! A week early, the
second part of Lost Light's "The Everlasting Voices" trilogy of issues arrives, picking up directly from the end of
issue 16 and its long awaited final page revelation. Rodimus and his crew have apparently reached some kind of afterlife or purgatory, but some of them aren't ready to accept this as their fate leading to the primary conflict of the story. This latest chapter sheds more light on whether or not that's even a worry for the team while simultaneously advancing characterizations, the overall IDW Transformers mythology, the series' main plot, and more "B" and "C" side-plots than you'll be able to believe in just 20 pages.
Everything is fine.As the end of everything approaches, at least for this Transformers continuity,
Lost Light now feels like it's in full stride with moving the series along into its last 160-ish pages of the quest. I mention this on the off chance you're reading this review and are curious if this is a good time to jump in and start reading these comics, now that the end is near. I'm happy to tell you that it is! Just don't start with this one. Go back to
at least Lost Light #1 and this will be waiting for you at the end of one excellent binge.
Mortilus of House BoltonIt would be difficult to point out the sundry of ways, both small and large, that
Lost Light #17 achieves precisely what a middle chapter ought to without burying the review in spoilers. A few key moments are worth a somewhat purposely vague mention here regardless, in particular the part-flashback, part-montage sequence expanding on a concept first discussed in significant detail all the way back in the
2012 More Than Meets The Eye Annual. It reminds me of
Marvel UK's 150th issue where Simon Furman presents what could be taken as a long-winded exposition dump and crafts it in such a freaking
cool way that you won't care even if you generally don't like those types of sequences.
Another smaller, yet still ultimately and pointedly significant element which strikes a similar chord involves Nautica and the consequences of more recent events in
Lost Light issues #8 and #9 . Near the point where this latest installment draws to a close, and just when everything starts to make sense, it unwinds in an almost brutally unapologetic way. Immediately thereafter, yet another moment somehow, in some way, twists the landscape even further right before leaving you alone to think about what you witnessed for another month while you await issue 18 with yearning anticipation. If this anticipation doesn't hit you then, it's likely to be caused by at least one of several other moments in the issue that will set off a light bulb in your head right before smashing it to pieces - in a good way.
Just in time to be wrong again, Rungspiracy returnsThe events contained within
Lost Light #17 require a deft hand to have the appropriate impact, and the lines of Jack Lawrence supplemented by the lighting and palette of Joana Lafuente deliver. On the line work, while I've said much about the emotive gestures and facial expressions Lawrence is capable of in the past, this issue also demonstrates a wisdom of knowing when to go the other direction and include an element of stoicism in the visual character work. Lafuente has a more subtle challenge with the setting varying from a darkened room to a darkened starscape over a dark metal planetary surface to dark-ish interior corridors, with only the slightest break in between. Characters are kept vivid while not looking like cut-outs despite the sometimes high contrast between their own colors and the background, adding to the surrealism of the scenario unfolding through the plot itself. Tom B. Long once again contributes in new, surprising ways, using varied fonts that add to both the visible storytelling and the perception of events from the reader's perspective.
The cover budgets look to have been scaled back, with two covers readily available and a third retailer incentive cover that is, as it was on issue 16, line art of the "A" cover for the issue. The colored version sold as the "A" cover, by Lawrence and Lafuente, is shown in this news story's thumbnail, and as always you can look up all the covers, credits, and potentially-spoiler-laden character appearances in our
Vector Sigma Database entry for Lost Light #17.
Verdict
Rodimus knows the importance of a good lawyer This was an easy review to write. Quite a bit happens and it all either makes sense while providing answers or creates genuinely exciting new questions. Nothing is lingered on for too long but the important moments are still made to feel as such while leaving room for other developments to stoke the flame of desire for the arrival of the next chapter. I can't think of anything else to ask for out of a book published in a serial format. For those that have been following this series and predecessor
More Than Meets The Eye, this is going to be a very good Wednesday.
Questions are possibly answered. Rodimus makes possibly bad, yet well intended decisions. The murky history of the Transformers' origin in IDW is possibly made clear. Relationships are possibly deepened for some, and for others, a desired sense of closure is possibly attained. Ratchet is possibly right about everything. In short, this 17th installment of
Lost Light is possibly a quintessential example of what James Roberts and the plethora of creative talents associated with the series do best. You'll laugh, you'll think, and you might even cry. To borrow (and transform) a phrase from the late, great Jim Valvano, that's a full book.
Bonus! James Roberts' soundtrack suggestions for this issue:
- Susanna Hoffs & Bleachers - "I'm Ready to Move On/Wild Heart Reprise"
- Yo La Tengo - "All Your Secrets"
- The Mountain Goats - "Your Belgian Things"
- The Flaming Lips - "Waitin' for a Superman (Peter Mokran Remix)"
