IDW Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye #44 RI Cover by Agnes Garbowska

Cmdr. Trailblazer wrote:...wow. Um, yeah. This is funny, cute....and unusual all in one package. Cool, though. I like it.

Doesn't that basically sum up MTMTE?

Um, kawaii? What's up wit Megs?

Cmdr. Trailblazer wrote:

D-Maximus_Prime wrote:

Nexus Knight wrote:

Cmdr. Trailblazer wrote:...wow. Um, yeah. This is funny, cute....and unusual all in one package. Cool, though. I like it.

Doesn't that basically sum up MTMTE?

In as many words yes, so much so

That's what I thought when I made the post.

Glad we're on the same page commander

fenrir72 wrote:So kawaiiiiiiiiiiiii! ( up yours you %$#$% to "if the shoe fits" if you take issue at the word kawaii)

I sure won't, here's my previous comment:

SillySpringer wrote:Um, kawaii? What's up wit Megs?

I love using the word kawaii, even if I'm confused.

Crosscheck wrote:My theory on Megatron's sudden desire to go questing is that he only wants to make it appear that he is doing it to piss Rodimus off. He is actually doing it to delay the Lost Light from finding the Knights of Cybertron. He is afraid of what the Knights' judgment will be. If he is guilty, then he will probably be destroyed or separated from the crew he is growing to like. It would also mean he really is the irredeemable monster everyone has said he is. If he is innocent, then he wavered from his ideals for nothing.

I also still want to know what he is going to do with the briefcase. He obviously has something planned that involves time travel.

Also, I now need to make a little Ten plush to stick inside the cockpit of my CW Ultra Magnus. Is anyone good with autocad so I can just 3D print one?

What if all this is leading to Megatron becoming Terminus and he goes back in time to be his own mentor under a different name?

With our charming and prestigious Comics Editor and News Administrator Va'al otherwise indisposed, it's fallen on me to take up the reigns for this week's review of IDW's More Than Meets The Eye #44. As warned already, this one will be spoiler heavy throughout, because there's no way I can adequately review this thing if I'm trying to not tell you things about it. Since some of the text gets front paged, I'm just typing up things to delay the start of the actual review. This is your Swerve recap. Need a review with no spoilers? Here it is: stop reading my stupid words and go buy this. Now. Stop, really, and go spend $4 right the hell now on this book. I'm serious, if you want to read this issue (you do), and you read this review beforehand, you will regret it. Don't have regrets, the internet can wait.



So with all that out of the way, let me tell you what author James Roberts has done here. This is an issue about the value of life, dogma, love, hope, expectation, and consequences. Oh, and Transformers, I suppose. Strap in your feelings, we're going for a ride.



We'll start with Rodimus, like you do when writing about MTMTE. We're joined on the first page with Rewind attempting to tell Rodimus a story, this time about the mysterious, legendary Necrobot. Rodimus, naturally, seems to not care. There are more important things that can be done, like get attention for being The Best Guy because he's carved a map to Cyberutopia on a table. Forget this side-quest, The Best Captain has done a thing, so naturally, we have to follow up on this.



Only this doesn't go to plan for him, as Megatron, The Other Captain, thinks one more little side quest isn't such a big deal. Under the guise of continuing to be very, almost unusually, caring about Rewind, off they go to look for the Necrobot. Why do they do this?



Well that's something, isn't it? So off they go, eventually landing on the Necrobot's planet. Without going into too much plot summary (much of the above was in the previews anyhow), and without spoiling too much of the absolutely stunning art by Hayato Sakamoto, colored by Joana Lafuente in images, there are some other themes and points worth serious note.

First, the buddy cop duo that never was/is likely never to be: Nightbeat and the Necrobot.



At the start of this issue, we know positively very extremely little about the Necrobot. Within the confines of this one single comic, we learn a gigantic ton about him. The Necrobot, through his interaction with Nightbeat, is wholly fleshed out as a character. The storytelling here is simply marvelous, touching on Nightbeat's expectations that maybe, just maybe there's something more to the ideas of religious dogma, or supernatural powers existing in the universe. It turns out that the Necrobot doesn't live up to this, he's really just a guy (I told you there would be spoilers) named Censere. Censere tells him, in my favorite panel of the book, that he should still hope anyhow if he wants to. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Oh, and his cape. I want one. Just go read it, you'll see what I mean.

Next, but not last, it's time to reflect on the latest goings on in my favorite romance in fiction these days: Chromedome and Rewind.



As a guideline, I'm never much into fictional romance. Love is a fickle thing and it's extremely hard to make a compelling story about it without falling into, literally, a gillion tropes, cliches, and stretches of cringe-worthy dialogue. Roberts continues to utterly avoid all of this and provide a story about two souls on a journey that deeply care about one another to their core. I should also point out that this is yet more consistent, meaningful, and impacting character development that's handled in just the fewest of pages. It doesn't take a lot of time to be satisfying, and this is where I point out that the lettering of Tom B. Long really helps in setting the dialogue's tone appropriately. The voices in your head won't emphasize the wrong words, which can't always be said in comics.

Finally, the least obvious (until the end, that is) featured story in the issue. Who is this issue about, really?



The renaissance of Megatron is continued here, and he's always there in this one, just off to the side, sometimes being snarky, but then... well, I'm not going to post the last two page spread because it's incredible. With the last sentence of this book, any emotions I had to spend were spent. Sometimes consequences aren't as material as you want them to be. Instead, they end up being something more, something worse - true guilt.



This one's an embodiment of Samwise Gamgee's very famous lines from Tolkien's The Two Towers, but everyone knows those, I think. Is this the best comic I've ever read? Probably. As I said at the start, go buy this. Maybe buy one for a friend too.



Bonus! James Roberts' soundtrack suggestions for this issue:

• The Smiths - Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want
• A Camp - Song for the Leftovers

I thought it was an amazing issue. It really did speak volumes for Megatron and Nightbeat, plus chromedome and rewind. And I did not notice any real continuity errors, so I fail to see where that is coming from. This was both an explanatory read and an emotional one, and I for one am touched. Megatron has really grown on me, like a lot

ScottyP wrote:Yeah, I'm curious about continuity errors. I didn't notice any, then again, the impact of the story would have distracted me from them. All I know of is a footnote error which JR acknowledged on Twitter, so I'm sure that'll get taken care of in the trade.

I caught them while reading. Someone listed them on the issues page at tfwiki. They're sound

Just ... weird.

Why was Rodimus drawn as a fembot from the waist down?

I believe that MTMTE is aimed at the LGBT portion of the fandom and Hasbro knows this which is why MTMTE is never included as a pack in comic with the toys.

Since the MTMTE is not intended for me I will be dropping the book before #50. There won't be much to see after #50 since the book seems to be collapsing in on itself anyway.