Seibertron.com Energon Pub Forums

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 6:56 pm**

Quick heads up for those of you patiently awaiting a proper Death's Head figure, his Avengers Infinite wave is available for pre-order at site sponsor BigBadToyStore. At the moment no singles are available, only sets of seven and cases of twelve.

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 7:06 pm**

Ahh, Death's Head. You can set him up with your Marvel figures, your Doctor Who figures, or your Transformers figures and he'd still fit in, yes?

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 7:28 pm**

What does Deathy up there do in the transformers universe? I wanna buy him, but I also want motive...

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 7:31 pm**

BeastProwl wrote:What does Deathy up there do in the transformers universe? I wanna buy him, but I also want motive...

Apparently he's from some filler material written only for the original Marvel comics run of Transformers, and THEN only for those published in the United Kingdom. I have no idea why, either.

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 9:16 pm**

Wolfman Jake wrote:
BeastProwl wrote:What does Deathy up there do in the transformers universe? I wanna buy him, but I also want motive...

Apparently he's from some filler material written only for the original Marvel comics run of Transformers, and THEN only for those published in the United Kingdom. I have no idea why, either.

Filler? Um, nothing that Death's Head appeared in for Transformers UK was filler. At least, not in the sense that the UK stories were telling their own story, of which he was a crucial aspect, separate from the American stories.

As for what he did:

He tried to get the hit on Galvatron after Rodimus Prime put out a reward on Galvatron's head.
He murdered Bumblebee.
He tried to get the hit on Rodimus Prime after the Decepticons put a bounty on Rodimus's head.
He tried to get the hit on Cyclonus and Scourge after having received a down payment from the Autobots.
He became an unwilling servant of Unicron.
He killed Future Shockwave.
He bartered with Unicron, offering Rodimus Prime and the Matrix in exchange for Death's Head's freedom.

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 9:17 pm**

Wrong website !!!

Ryan's gonna be pissed. He said only official Transformers brand products get front paged. :BOOM:

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 9:25 pm**

Rated X wrote:Wrong website !!!

Ryan's gonna be pissed. He said only official Transformers brand products get front paged.

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 9:46 pm**

Ryan must be happy to finally see that Deaths Head. One can only hope we see it in the Legends line too. Really psyched for that Eric Masterson Thor.

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 9:52 pm**

Yep, like I said, filler.

It's UK only stories, and yeah...that's just a continuity mess.
Seriously, if you're going to put in Death's Head in your Transformers collection, you might as well throw Spider-Man in there too. And any GI JOE characters you'd like too.

Why were the UK comics padded out with all that additional "content" anyway? Did that happen with any other Marvel books during the 80's when crossing the Atlantic Ocean?

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 10:08 pm**

I collect nothing but Transformers, and I can assure you Death's Head will be in mine.

Death's Head was originally written my Simon Furman as a disposable character for use in the Transformers UK comic. However, he didn't want Hasbro latching onto DH so my introduced the character in a short that was published prior to his appearance in Transformers. That little bit of foresight on Furman's part is the only reason DH isn't exclusively a Transformers character.

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 10:12 pm**

Wake me when he gets a Kreon.
Wait, can he get a Kreon, or am I going to have to wait for Lego or something?

I take it he swapped the green armor for blue and ditched the (seemingly) brown leather gloves after his time with the Transformers? I kinda like that look better...

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 11:07 pm**

Death's Head is going to be awesome. I've waited since 1987 for a figure of this guy. Can't wait to have him in my hands at long last.

To those of you bitching about Death's Head news coverage ... I grew up, in the US, reading Transformers UK comics when I could get my hands on them at local comic stores in the Detroit area. Death's Head is a much bigger character in the Marvel Transformers Universe than even Circuit Breaker or Blackrock. He certainly made a bigger splash!

If you're not familiar with him or his awesomeness, you're missing out, yes?

Posted: **Thu Mar 20, 2014 11:09 pm**

Seibertron wrote:Death's Head is going to be awesome. I've waited since 1987 for a figure of this guy. Can't wait to have him in my hands at long last.

To those of you bitching about Death's Head news coverage ... I grew up, in the US, reading Transformers UK comics when I could get my hands on them at local comic stores in the Detroit area. Death's Head is a much bigger character in the Marvel Transformers Universe than even Circuit Breaker or Blackrock. He certainly made a bigger splash!

If you're not familiar with him or his awesomeness, you're missing out, yes?

Yes? x100

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 1:17 am**

Sabrblade wrote:
Rated X wrote:Wrong website !!!

Ryan's gonna be pissed. He said only official Transformers brand products get front paged.

I had a few Marvel TF comics as a kid (not UK books) I think they were the reason I never got into the comics. Too many super hero/villain style characters like Robot Master, Mechanic, Circuit Breaker, etc. for my tastes. That type of stuff didn't fly with the G1 cartoon. Glad to see IDW isn't really into that type of stuff either from the little bit I have read that come free with the new Generations deluxes.

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 3:44 am**

Wolfman Jake wrote:Yep, like I said, filler.

It's UK only stories, and yeah...that's just a continuity mess.
Seriously, if you're going to put in Death's Head in your Transformers collection, you might as well throw Spider-Man in there too. And any GI JOE characters you'd like too.

Why were the UK comics padded out with all that additional "content" anyway? Did that happen with any other Marvel books during the 80's when crossing the Atlantic Ocean?

As reader of the UK comics from issue 113 through 332, I can assure you that the future stories were far more than just filler. In many cases were better than the US material that was being reprinted between them, which made the US stories feel far more like the filler.

They also fit into the continuity quite nicely up until the future stories are effectively concluded with "Time Wars". After that the UK only material begins to have continuity issues mainly thanks to the continuity mess that is Earthforce.

The additional content came for the UK comic being weekly instead of monthly (hence over 300 issues).

Back on topic: Death's Head will be mine!

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 6:59 am**

As a kid I grew up in Ireland. I thought Deaths head was BADASS. I cannot wait to add him to my collection. I have wanted a deaths head figure for almost 30 years! I will have to cut off his right hand, stick his ax in there, glue his shield to his back and stick some additional weapons on his back to recreate the look from the comic.

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 7:55 am**

Is it really a bit of nostalgia glasses, though, thinking Death's Head was really "badass"? Obviously, I had no exposure to the character or the Marvel comics (US or UK) during G1. The original cartoon was my defacto Transformers fiction. Looking over the comic content with Death's Head now, he really comes off pretty forced and silly to me. I agree with the notion that he is just too super hero-villainy for the more sci-fi tone of Transformers I've come to love.

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 8:24 am**

Wolfman Jake wrote:Yep, like I said, filler.

It's UK only stories, and yeah...that's just a continuity mess.

Like Trek said, the only UK stories that have any real conflicts with the U.S. ones are the Earthforce ones, which even Simon Furman acknowledges as a separate continuity. The rest that all came before fit in rather well and, also like Trek pointed out, were of a superior quality to the far more goofier American stories.

Wolfman Jake wrote:Seriously, if you're going to put in Death's Head in your Transformers collection, you might as well throw Spider-Man in there too. And any GI JOE characters you'd like too.

Not when those were all one- or two-issue guest stars (or in the Joes' case, co-stars exclusive to crossover events), while Death's Head, as Ryan noted, was a major player whose first biggest role was in the Transformers comics before his making the jump over to other Marvel properties and getting his own series.

Wolfman Jake wrote:Why were the UK comics padded out with all that additional "content" anyway? Did that happen with any other Marvel books during the 80's when crossing the Atlantic Ocean?

It was because of the difference in comic release schedules between the US and the UK. In the US, comics came out on a monthly basis, while the UK had them out weekly. Due to the faster schedule in the UK, as well as a demand for more comic content, Marvel UK had little choice but to start churning out their own material in addition to the importation of American issues.

And though the comics the UK created stuck to the story and world of the US comics, they eventually evolved from being additional stories written in between and on the side of US issues into being their own entity entirely, with the UK issues (while still coming out and being slotted in between US issue reprints) developing their own ongoing arcs that took place parallel to those in the US issues, and would sometimes overlap with the US stories, having the casts of characters from both interacting with each other in big events, which took place in the form of "epics".

The UK stories were oftentimes richer than the US stories, and overall helped to enhance the world of the Marvel Transformers comics on many levels. For instance, the UK issues gave more focus and exploration to several characters that the US comics seemed to ignore. Like, the US comics barely gave any focus to the Dinobots after their debut issue until only after Optimus Prime died many issues later. But the UK issues had been giving the Dinobots plenty of character attention to help them become very popular as a characters (rather than merely popular for being "dinosaur robots"). And the 1986 movie cast was largely unused in the US comics for quite awhile, while the UK comics used that cast to give the UK comics its own group of people to play with and to help shape the world that the UK comics would go on to create.

As for it happening with other comics, it definitely happened when G.I. Joe came over as Action Force, and that case was even more complicated since the Action Force comics established not only its own universe but one that, IIRC, had the international-based Action Force and the American-based G.I. Joe as separate teams who worked separated from each other and would sometimes team up as allies before eventually coming together to merge into one team called "G.I. Joe the Action Force" (later shortened to just "G.I. Joe" to create a consistency between the US and UK brand name).

Wolfman Jake wrote:Is it really a bit of nostalgia glasses, though, thinking Death's Head was really "badass"? Obviously, I had no exposure to the character or the Marvel comics (US or UK) during G1. The original cartoon was my defacto Transformers fiction. Looking over the comic content with Death's Head now, he really comes off pretty forced and silly to me. I agree with the notion that he is just too super hero-villainy for the more sci-fi tone of Transformers I've come to love.

Actions speak louder than word, my friend, and thus no amount of praise any of us here can give to the character could really do him justice without one having read the comics he appeared in. His character arc was simply that intriguing to us that we all latched onto the character rather well, so I'd say it'd only be best for you to check out the comics that he showed up in to see for yourself why we find this guy so appealing, yes?

Though, it's definitely no nostalgia glasses for me, in my case, since I wasn't born until after the 80's and only read all the Marvel stuff just a few short years ago. :-B

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 8:43 am**

That "Yes?" schtick isn't helping me like the character.

I can appreciate that he's got a little cult following, but he's just not for me. Weird vocal patterns are my bane, especially when in print. I could barely stand to read the tfwiki entry for Death's Head written in homage to his peculiar dialect.

Besides that, he's not a Transformer, and so is of little interest to me personally. Other characters from the G1 comics I've come to appreciate as part of the Transformers mythos, thanks in part to their introduction and involvement in other Transformers continuities later on. Death's Head just feels like a Marvel guest star to me. Like I said, he fits in about as well with my personal display as Spider-Man or Cobra Commander. :lol:

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 8:44 am**

Sorry, double post!

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 8:55 am**

Wolfman Jake wrote:That "Yes?" schtick isn't helping me like the character. I can appreciate that he's got a little cult following, but he's just not for me. Weird vocal patterns are my bane, especially when in print. I could barely stand to read the tfwiki entry for Death's Head written in homage to his peculiar dialect.

For me, when I saw him and read his dialogue for the first time, I couldn't help but hear the late great Tony Jay's voice coming out of his mouth. :lol:

Wolfman Jake wrote:Besides that, he's not a Transformer, and so is of little interest to me personally.

On the flipside, he is a mechanoid, rather than a fleshling.

Wolfman Jake wrote:Other characters from the G1 comics I've come to appreciate as part of the Transformers mythos, thanks in part to their introduction and involvement in other Transformers continuities later on. Death's Head just feels like a Marvel guest star to me. Like I said, he fits in about as well with my personal display as Spider-Man or Cobra Commander.

Thing is, unlike other Marvel characters, he started off in the TF comics before switching over to the bigger Marvel stuff. It would feel like if Spike Witwicky left the TF comics and became a mainstream Marvel character.

Come to the think of it, in the comics, Death's Head was probably even more involved in the TFs than Spike was. 8-}

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 9:34 am**

Wolfman Jake wrote:Is it really a bit of nostalgia glasses, though, thinking Death's Head was really "badass"? Obviously, I had no exposure to the character or the Marvel comics (US or UK) during G1. The original cartoon was my defacto Transformers fiction. Looking over the comic content with Death's Head now, he really comes off pretty forced and silly to me. I agree with the notion that he is just too super hero-villainy for the more sci-fi tone of Transformers I've come to love.

So you have no exposure to Death's Head but you're confident in saying based on your no exposure at all, that Death's Head wasn't BADASS? If you read some of the comics with him, he really was quite badass, took a licking and kept on ticking (and time travelling too)

I was the opposite I guess, I never really got into superhero comics when I was little, so I never picked up him being super villianesque, It just struck me as cool that he was a robot bounty hunter, and the only other bounty hunter I knew was Boba Fett, so I instantly thought him badass.

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 10:17 am**

Sabrblade wrote:
Wolfman Jake wrote:Besides that, he's not a Transformer, and so is of little interest to me personally.
On the flipside, he is a mechanoid, rather than a fleshling.

Very true. Though, I can't say all the human characters rub me the wrong way in Transformers. Spike, Sparkplug, and company were fairly benign in the original cartoon. They acted reasonably intelligently and with bravery. They felt like an extention of the Autobot team. Then came Daniel in the movie, and nothing was ever right again...until Animated, at least.

Sabrblade wrote:
Wolfman Jake wrote:Other characters from the G1 comics I've come to appreciate as part of the Transformers mythos, thanks in part to their introduction and involvement in other Transformers continuities later on. Death's Head just feels like a Marvel guest star to me. Like I said, he fits in about as well with my personal display as Spider-Man or Cobra Commander.
Thing is, unlike other Marvel characters, he started off in the TF comics before switching over to the bigger Marvel stuff. It would feel like if Spike Witwicky left the TF comics and became a mainstream Marvel character.

Come to the think of it, in the comics, Death's Head was probably even more involved in the TFs than Spike was.

Well, technically Death's Head did start off with a one-page appearance in a non-Transformers Marvel book, just before his introduction in the UK G1 comics, for the very purpose that he'd be Marvel's own character to use as they pleased and NOT a Hasbro "Transforemrs" character. I've got a hunch he was perhaps Furman's own little alter ego, and he wanted him to "himself", as much as such was possible in the 80's.

Sideshow Sideswipe wrote:
Wolfman Jake wrote:Is it really a bit of nostalgia glasses, though, thinking Death's Head was really "badass"? Obviously, I had no exposure to the character or the Marvel comics (US or UK) during G1. The original cartoon was my defacto Transformers fiction. Looking over the comic content with Death's Head now, he really comes off pretty forced and silly to me. I agree with the notion that he is just too super hero-villainy for the more sci-fi tone of Transformers I've come to love.

So you have no exposure to Death's Head but you're confident in saying based on your no exposure at all, that Death's Head wasn't BADASS? If you read some of the comics with him, he really was quite badass, took a licking and kept on ticking (and time travelling too)

I was the opposite I guess, I never really got into superhero comics when I was little, so I never picked up him being super villianesque, It just struck me as cool that he was a robot bounty hunter, and the only other bounty hunter I knew was Boba Fett, so I instantly thought him badass.

I would like to posit that you don't always have to experience something to know you don't really want anything to do with it.

Like I said, I think I became aware of Death's Head at the wrong time in my life to really "get it." I most certainly admit that I do not get Death's Head, and I feel little loss about it. For what it's worth, I never really got the all the fandom love for Boba Fett either. Again, I didn't pay attention to the ancillary, expanded universe Star Wars stuff. I just saw the movies, in which (at least for the first trilogy), he was barely more than a "Hi and Die" character. I know the originals have been revised to rectify this, and the second trillogy gave him some backstory, but originally, there honestly wasn't a lot to the character.

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 10:57 am**

Wolfman Jake wrote:Well, technically Death's Head did start off with a one-page appearance in a non-Transformers Marvel book, just before his introduction in the UK G1 comics, for the very purpose that he'd be Marvel's own character to use as they pleased and NOT a Hasbro "Transforemrs" character.

Indeed. Taking this into account is precisely why I carefully chose to use the word "feel" instead of my original choice of "be", for that wouldn't be correct to say, but it would still have the "feeling" of such without technically "being" such.

Posted: **Fri Mar 21, 2014 11:09 am**

Sabrblade wrote:
Wolfman Jake wrote:Well, technically Death's Head did start off with a one-page appearance in a non-Transformers Marvel book, just before his introduction in the UK G1 comics, for the very purpose that he'd be Marvel's own character to use as they pleased and NOT a Hasbro "Transforemrs" character.
Indeed. Taking this into account is precisely why I carefully chose to use the word "feel" instead of my original choice of "be", for that wouldn't be correct to say, but it would still have the "feeling" of such without technically "being" such.

Basically I came on here to say I thought death's head was awesome. :HEADHURTS:

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Re: Death's Head Avengers Infinite Wave Available for Pre-Order @ BBTS

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