Marvel's The Transformers Year Two, Part I: Dinobot Hunt! (US #13-14 / UK #42-54)

This set of stories is mostly UK stories, with a couple US ones at the end. In the early years of the book, at least, there's pattern of four US issues and then a set of UK stories and so on; in this case, though the four US stories span two of my posts, so I'll cover the other two US ones from this sequence next week. It also incorporates two "special" stories: one from the 1986 UK annual (I haven't even gotten through all the stories from the 1985 annual yet, but this one fits best here) and one from... Woman's Day!?

Crisis of Command! / The Icarus Theory / Dinobot Hunt! / "Victory!" / "Shooting Star!" / "Rock and Roll-Out!" / "The Night the Transformers Saved Christmas", from The Transformers US #13-14 (Feb.-Mar. 1986) / The Transformers UK #42-54 (4 Jan.–29 Mar. 1986), The Transformers Annual [1986], and Woman's Day 26 Dec. 1985; reprinted in The Transformers: Til All Are One Compendium One (2025)

scripts by Mike Collins, James Hill, Simon Furman, and Bob Budiansky; pencils by Geoff Senior, John Stokes, Barry Kitson, Will Simpson, and Don Perlin [with Herb Trimpe]; inks by Geoff Senior, John Stokes, Barry Kitson, Will Simpson, Marc Griffiths, Tim Perkins, and Al Gordon; colours by Steve Whitaker, Gina Hart, Stuart Place, Jeff Anderson, and Nel Yomtov; letters by Mike Scott, Starkings, Annie Halfacree, and Janice Chiang

from The Transformers UK #44

Crisis of Command! picks up on a detail seeded in the previous UK story about how Optimus is feeling a lack of confidence in his abilities following how Shockwave removed his head and almost made off with the Creation Matrix. In later years, Optimus's crises of confidence would go so frequent one wondered how he ever rose to a position of leadership at all, but this one is decently done; he waffles a bit, and then realizes he is awesome, crisis over. This is nicely paralleled to the various Decepticons jockeying for authority in the absence of Shockwave.

Then we have two Dinobot-focused stories. In the first, The Icarus Theory, a human scientist dredges up the body of Swoop and figures out how to remote control it. This was, like most Furman stories, interestingly told, though I found the climax a bit rushed and underbaked. It leads into the next; Ratchet realizes Swoop was rendered mindless by his millennia of submersion in the Savage Lands and that the other Dinobots (who departed for parts unknown) would have suffered the same, so the Autobots must hunt them down... only there are Decepticons on their tail. I found Dinobot Hunt! confusing and jumpy, a rare total misfire from Furman. Partially the issue is too many characters; I usually struggle to keep track of the largely indistinguishable G1 characters. I did like the epilogue story, "Victory!", about what the Dinobots dream as they await repair and revival. You can't go wrong with Geoff Senior drawing the Dinobots!

from The Transformers US #13

One thing that has surprised me about this project is that I did not have very good memories of Bob Budiansky's stories... but his stories from issues #5 to 12 have been quite good. Not high art, but solid kids' comics; the way he has kept the sf elements grounded in the real world through Buster has been quite effective. But in the two stories here, I feel like Budiansky has completely lost, almost overnight, what made the early stories work. (In his history of the comic, Stuart Webb speculates Budiansky thought he would be off the book at issue #12.) 

In the first, we finally learn what happened to Megatron, trapped in gun mode when last seen. A cowardly hood finds him, using him to strike at his enemies. I feel like this had real potential, but there's barely any Megatron in the story. Aside from a brief conversation, Megatron is mostly trapped in gun mode, so he's just a nice weapon for the protagonist to yield. Imagine if the emphasis of the story wasn't on Megatron-as-tool, but Megatron-as-advisor, if he'd helped this guy by encouraging his ruthless side. So much better!

The other story is the first of many dumb Decepticon plans we'll be subjected to. In this one... they are stealing music from rock concerts? Okay sure. Both are drawn by Don Perlin; his work isn't great but I seem to recall he comes to grips with Transformers better as he goes.

from Woman's Day 26 Dec. 1985

Lastly, there's a very short story (just four pages) originally published in Women's Day, I guess so moms could share it with their kids. It's a Christmas tale, so the compendium puts it later, with the 1986 UK Christmas strip, but in terms of narrative and character status, it fits in nicely after US #14. Just ignore the fact that it was Christmas only a few strips ago! It's fine, you know.

This is the fourth in a series of posts about Marvel's The Transformers. The next covers US issues #15-16 and UK issues #54-63. Previous installments are listed below:

1. US #1-3 & 33-34 / UK #1-6 & 9-17 (1984-85)
2. US #4-8 / UK #7-8 & 18-30 (1984-85) 
3. US #9-12 / UK #31-41 (1985-86)