"Leave No Autobot Uncrushed!"- TRANSFORMERS #6 Review

“LEAVE NO AUTOBOT UNCRUSHED!!!”

The final issue in the first story arc of IDW’s Transformers Ongoing comic series does pretty much what you would hope it would do. Motivations are revealed, and we have an ultimate climax of situations as we follow up last issue’s cliffhanger of good ol’ Swindle ready to have Menasor... CRUSH ALL THE AUTOBOTS!

Credits for this issue's creation go to:

Written by: Mike Costa
Art: Don Figueroa
Colors by: J. Brown with Andrew Dalhouse
Letters by: Chris Mowry
Editor: Andy Schmidt
Associate Editor: Denton J. Tipton

Last Issue:

The stunticons were reunited, Ultra Magnus confronts the Autobot/Decepticon group, and Spike has a heart to heart with Optimus Prime about why the giant robot surrendered to Skywatch.

This Issue:

The relationships and growth of characters that has happened in the IDW books seem to really become evident as recent events in Spotlight Prowl, TRANSFORMERS Bumblebee, and of course, TRANSFORMERS Ongoing have finally come to fruition.

What I liked:

The action is fun. Pure and simple, metal-mashing robots. Lots of gunplay, and some nifty dialogue make this, if nothing else a fun read. If that’s why you like Transformers, pick this issue up to see some ‘SMASHING’ being done.

...But there is more...

Thundercracker makes an important step that I think many will find helps his character to grow even further toward what IDW has set up for him. But does it seem a step too far? Will he be allowed to be a Decepticon anymore? Does he even want to be?



Bumblebee goes Goldbug and grows up...Bumblebee Prime??? The BUMBLEBEE miniseries dragged us through a painful four issue process of Bumblebee becoming more confident, and better able to lead the Autobots. He steps even further into this role thanks to Optimus Prime, Ultra Magnus, and Rodimus, but now seems to embrace it.



Optimus Prime, even though confused himself, still uses his reputation to inspire and build confidence in the other Autobots.



The humans finally wise up. Well, Spike as a leader wises up. I actually like the human element realized in this issue. Spike comes down from his pedestal a moment to reflect upon his actions and how his immaturity has cost others. The idea that not everything is black and white finally hits him, and he also grows from it, realizing that he perhaps has a greater duty than he has been taking responsibility for previously.

And FINALLY they realize that there are good Transformers and bad Transformers, and they might be able to work with good ones to help them in their efforts to stop the BAD ones.



The art was very well rendered and images were excellent in quality and detail. Great movement and emotion shown in the figures in the pages, Don really shows his stuff with fantastic detail.

What I didn’t like:

SPOILER!!!!Optimus Prime has to save the day SPOILER!!!
(Even though he gets the ideas from another person who gets them from someone else). It seems to come about too easily. But you know, it’s fiction, so things like that can happen. It also seems just too easy of a choice for Spike to make to get Optimus back in the mix.



Rodimus the cry baby. Okay it’s harsh to say that, but of the characters who have grown and changed the most over this story arc, I think his character has taken the biggest step backwards. It seems inconsistent with where he was in TRANSFORMERS SPOTLIGHT HOT ROD, the -ation series, and even in MAX DINOBOTS...what happened? Why ignore the treatment that you had set up for a character to totally change him into another? What purpose do the writers have for him? Some will like how Hot Rod has been written, and others won’t.

Some would also say the same thing for Optimus Prime. His character perhaps has taken a step backwards as to what he started out portrayed as in the IDW-verse. But is it to show just how complicated this new situation is, and just how much it DOES effect even the 'great' leaders? That answer is coming, hopefully.



Thundercracker seems a bit too goody-goody. Again, is it a change for the better, or worse? Will readers be happy with it, or not?

The art style still has me wondering. It is beautifully rendered most of the time, but the faces still are at times hard to accept, read, or recognize. The humans seem to be to me, the opposite...not very detailed or realistic looking in their features, most of the time.



I also wonder what in the world they are going to do with such a large cast of robots now that the rosters of Bumblebee and Ongoing have merged. Will the Season 1 robots still tend to take the spotlight as they usually do, or will we see others stepping up and being used and explored more?

Pick this issue up for yourself as it wraps up the first TRANSFORMERS story arc, and sets the table for what will be happening next in the series. Check out the five-page preview here!

TRANSFORMERS #6 hits comic stores tomorrow!