The Energon Pub

Hi there!

Well I was lost form the fandom for about 3+ years and with only four months since my coming back, I get confused a lot with the new comic releases (I'm still stuck on LSoW go figure XD). I found a small thumbnail around here showing a War for cybertron comic, issue #1. Question is... is this new comic already released or not?

By the way and speaking of War for Cybertron... anyone's read Exodus book already? Is it a worth read?

Thanks guys ^^'

No, the comic isn't out yet. I'm sure someone around here knows or has a pretty good idea when we can expect to see it...maybe even check the IDW website.

I did read Exodus, and I was a bit dissappointed. Could be because I expected something different than what it was. Or could be that the story tried to tie up a whole bunch on continuities and that left me unsatisfied. I was hoping to get a lot more answers to the many holes there are in official storylines, but I think it kinda veered off into yet another direction...Maybe I'll read it again - sometimes I miss stuff. I wouldn't want you not to read it though - you should so you can have your own opinion.

Actually, the comic is out, but the only way you can apparently get it is to have pre-ordered the game at Target/Zellers before it came out.

You're not missing much, really. It's just a retelling of the council scene from early on in Exodus.

O.o damn preorders XD~~ I had mine from Amazon.
Wel, if it's not really that much then I won't sweat it. I thought it was going to give away more backstory for the game seeing as how Hasbro just tossed the game down our noses as official canon.
Still, thanks for telling me about the book. I will look for it at Amazon. I'm getting interested on reading it. Perhaps you missed something or it actually doesn't tell much, but that's a thing I yet have to find out ^^'
I guess it'd take more than just one book to fill in all the gaps G1 has gathered over the years. XD

Thanks, DB - see? I really do miss stuff....

And, SeekerNami, when you've read it, let me know what you thought!

Transformers: Exodus comments

***May contain some MILD spoilers***





The first half of Exodus is really good. It's does a nice job of building up the setting and establishing the characters before they became as we know them. And the relationship between Optimus (then Orion Pax) and Megatron was very interesting and a pretty original new take on it. I thoroughly enjoyed how the first half really set up the tension for the war to come.

Once the war starts however, I feel the book begins to gradually lose steam all the way to the end. The descriptions get more bland and character development pretty much goes out the window in favor of some mundane battle descriptions, predictable interactions between prominant characters, and a TON of fairly purposeless name-dropping.

The climax is not as terribly exciting as the author seems to want it to be, and by the end of the book he is throwing in a LOT of incredibly cheesy, senseless, and overly-blatant G1 references that have no point other than really pitiful, last-minute attempts at fanservice. He even goes so far as to get a direct quote from the G1 Transformers themesong into one of Optimus' monologues...yeesh...

And "Project Generation One" just made me cringe...


My two biggest complaints were these:

1) The author was way too stuck on throwing movie tie-ins into the story. Technically this new telling of the War for Cybertron isn't DIRECTLY connected to any specific continuity, but the game clearly seems to favor the G1 story. I am perfectly fine with this but in spite of the afore-mentioned rediculously direct and ill-conceived references to G1, the author of this novelization seemed pretty hung up on the movie and made far more attempts to tie the story into the movies than I was really comfortable with. The inclusion of elements like the Allspark, Bumblebee's broken voice-modulator, and the somewhat ambiguous ending left me feeling fairly unsatisfied...And it made no sense anyway because there were many more elements that did NOT tie into the movies so I'm not even sure what he was tryign to do there...

2) The story in the book differs from the game in almost all ways. Granted, the game's story isn't particularly dense or fleshed out and in that respect I liked the book better on the whole. But seeing as how they are supposed to be the same story, it was puzzling that they clearly aren't...I thought the book would be a prequel to the game but nothing matches up enough for that to be the case. Hell, Optimus Prime, while being called Orion Pax in the book (pre-Prime), is just called "Optimus" in the game before getting his title. Any type of cohesion that should have been present between the two mediums was completely ignored. There were some shared elements between the two and they were clearly meant to compliment each other, but in the end they just didn't.



I really didn't hate the book and as I said, the first half was largely exceptional in the realm of novelizations from other medias. But the author clearly lost his zest halfway through thge whole thing sort of fell apart.

I haven't played the game yet, but I did finish the book. It was pretty good, but lost steam in the second half. I also thought the ending was a bit rushed.

I would recommend it to any TF fan.

typh0id wrote:I really didn't hate the book and as I said, the first half was largely exceptional in the realm of novelizations from other medias. But the author clearly lost his zest halfway through thge whole thing sort of fell apart.

I didn't hate it either, and you summed it up really well. (I was trying to be vague on purpose!) The ending bothered me too, and that's the best way to put it - the author lost steam. I really think it could have been better - or maybe I just set my expectations too high - I really hoped the author would take the story seriously (and he did for awhile...)

It's always interesting to see what other's thoughts are. Usually I really like stuff that everyone else really hates!

Just got Exodus yeserday, Im on page 51. Its ok, I never imagined Cybertron in a caste system. And I always liked the idea of Megatron and Optimus being litteral brothers. And whats up with Sentinel Prime? I thought it was suposed to be Zeta. And Megatron seems too unthreatning for my tasts, he seems too compassionate towards Optimus, or should I say Orion. And the idea that Alpha Trion is one of the thirteenis pretty stupid to me. Also Megatron naming himself after one of the thirteen. The first chapter or so, I was kind of confused, there was too much going on. Usually anything Transformers I'd be like "this is the greatest thing evar!" But with Exodus, I dont feel it. They should get me to write the Transformers history! And Six Lasers? Really? Decepticons blowing up roller coasters on Cybertron!?

One more thing that bothered me is the Well of Allsparks, in the book its like a psysical place that you can actually go to. I always thought of it like Heaven or in this case, the Internet. Were theres like a web of sparks and at the center of that web is the Allspark. Thats what I always thought of it.

Stormer wrote:I really hoped the author would take the story seriously (and he did for awhile...)

Exactly. That's what really disappointed me...It DID seem like he was taking it seriously for awhile and then just sorta stopped caring and just wanted to get it done with...

It was hard to find a place to post my thoughts for this book, as there are no real singley dedicated threads to the book discussion only.

I found the book to be fun, but not serious. An attempt to tie all continuities into one was done, and somewhat achieved.

Minicons the name given to the smaller Transformers on Cybertron was okay.

Some things that bothered me.

The author could not make up his mind whether it was Constructicons or Combaticons he was talking about at times.

Pluraled Defensors, and Devastators... really? I hope not.

All the supposed Easter Eggs actually bothered me. The plasma energy chamber, the keys (like Vector Sigma), the Six Flags thing. Prowl was acting like a ninja? Now it's Animated? Bumblebee's voice box thing... "One shall stand, one shall fall...", "I still function..." etc.



I read it, I finished it. I didn't hate it.