Review: My Little Pony/Transformers: The Magic of Cybertron by James Asmus et al.

I guess the first Transformers/My Little Pony crossover must have sold well, because just five months after it came to an end, another one began-- and the end has hints for a third! While the first featured Queen Chrysalis bringing the Transformers to Equestria, this one has Megatron bringing the ponies to Cybertron, inadvertently releasing King Sombra in the process. Sombra promptly mind controls a group of ponies, Decepticons, and Autobots, and its up to the remaining ponies and Transformers on both sides to figure out a way to stop him from conquering two worlds.

IDW does a lot of these weird mash-ups: Transformers/G.I. Joe, Star Trek/Transformers, Star Trek / Legion of Super-Heroes, and so on. Part of what can make them less effective, I think, is that in your head, you can imagine six million different fun things that can happen... but if it's a four-issue miniseries telling a single story, there probably isn't room for most of those, and the resulting story is a bit more plodding. (The sheer insanity of Transformers vs. G.I. Joe is of course an exception to this.) Thus, I like the format of these MLP/TF crossovers. Each of the four issues contains two ten-page stories; in between the opener and the finale, we get can get six quick stories against the broad framework of "what would ponies do on Cybertron?" This lets the writers indulge whatever weird team-ups they like, without having to worry about how it all goes together. (Indeed, in some cases, they clearly haven't worried about how it fits together at all!)

from My Little Pony/Transformers #1
(script by Sam Maggs, art by Casey W. Coller)

So, in the six middle stories we get:

• a team-up between two lesbian parent couples (MLP's Holiday and Loftie, aunts/guardians of Scootaloo, and TF's Arcie and Greenlight, guardians of Gauge)
• a team-up between flying teams (MLP's Wonderbolts and TF's Seekers)
• a showdown between "Western" characters (MLP's Applejack and TF's Wildwheel)
• a team-up between musical characters (MLP's Vinyl Scratch and Octavia Melody and TF's Soundwave)
• a team-up between characters who are into beauty (MLP's Rarity, a fashion designer, and TF's Knock Out, a cosmetic surgeon)
• a team-up between reptiles (MLP's Spike and Smolder, both dragons, and TF's Dinobots)

MLP continuity seem to be pretty firmly rooted in the tv show's season 9, but the TF continuity-- as is usually the case for a lot of these crossovers-- seems to be based on the 1980s cartoon in its general precepts, but freely pulls characters and concepts from other continuities. (Arcie and Greenlight are from IDW's 2019-present ongoing, Wildwheel is from the 2018-present Cyberverse cartoon, Knock Out is from IDW's old 2005-18 continuity.)

from My Little Pony/Transformers #2
(script by Ian Flynn, art by Priscilla Tramontano)

They're all by different creative teams, and I liked some better than others, but I think literally every story had one great moment. The opener had an excellent Unicron gag; I loved Scootaloo zooming in on a Transformer scooter with a bunch of "kid" Autobots; the bit where Starscream expects everyone to cheer for him but instead they cheer for Rainbow Dash was perfectly done; Knock Out insisting that Rarity needed to see the beauty of Cybertron was a surprisingly good grace note, and Knock Out's speech about his love for fellow Decepticon Breakdown was pretty cute; and who wouldn't love Vinyl Scratch using Soundwave as her own sound system? Last time the finale was pretty perfunctory, but this time it has some good gags, too: the Mane Six are given exo-suits that let them transform, and Pinkie Pie's wondering what she'll turn into is fun, as is her delight at what she does become (yielded by Megatron, no less!). Starscream's last line is perfect.

I had two particular favorites. One was "One-Trick Pony" (from issue #2, by Sam Maggs and Trish Forstner), the Western-styled showdown between Applejack and Wildwheel. I didn't know Wildwheel (I've never seen Cyberverse), but this was a perfect Western pastiche, and it read brilliantly.

from My Little Pony/Transformers #4
(script by Ian Flynn, art by Casey W. Coller)

The other was, like last time, the Spike/Dinobot team-up (from issue #4, by Ian Flynn and Casey W. Coller). This just had a lot of good jokes, as Grimlock and Spike struggle to explain to the other Dinobots what makes Spike so cool. "Friend-Spike can fly, too!" "I'm... still learning, to be honest." "Him learning to fly! Him dragon! Breath fire, too!" "M-mostly to send correspondence..." "Telecomm fire!" But of course Spike comes through with the magic of friendship when they have to battle a combiner.

Are these comics great art? Well, I don't know, but they're certainly great comics. Like, what else could you want from them? I will definitely be here for any third volume. (That said, I think Transformation Is Magic would have been a much better subtitle.)

The Magic of Cybertron was originally published in issues #1-4 of My Little Pony/Transformers (Apr.-July 2021). The story was written by James Asmus (#1, 3-4), Sam Maggs (#1-2), Ian Flynn (#2, 4), and Tony Fleecs (#3); illustrated by Jack Lawrence (#1, 4), Casey W. Coller (#1, 4), Priscilla Tramontano (#2-3), Trish Forstner (#2), and Tony Fleecs (#3); colored by Luis Antonio Delgado (#1-4),  Joana Lafuente (#1-2, 4), and Tony Fleecs (#3), with flats by Lauren Perry (#3); lettered by Jake M. Wood and Neil Uyetake; and edited by Megan Brown.

Review: Transformers/My Little Pony: Friendship in Disguise! by James Asmus, Ian Flynn, et al.

Even though I tell him I'm largely only interested in the comics of IDW's main Transformers continuity, my comic book guy is forever sticking whatever random crossovers IDW does in my pull box. I have no interest in the Transformers meeting the Terminator or Marty McFly, but the moment I heard of Transformers/My Little Pony, I knew I had to get it. My wife is a big My Little Pony fan, so I have had a lot of exposure to the world, and the concept is so ridiculous that it would have to be sublime.

At its best, that is true. This isn't really one big story, but a series of short stories (each of the four issues contains two ten-pagers) set against a common backdrop. There are bookends that explain the set-up and provide a wrap-up: Queen Chrysalis tries to magically summon allies to aid in her takeover of Equestria, which pulls the Autobots and Decepticons from Cybertron through a malfunctioning spacebridge. The Decepticons agree to aid Chrysalis, while the Autobots try to help the ponies of Equestria. The six middle story provide a variety of encounters: Arcee and Rarity team up against Starscream, Spike and Grimlock battle the Constructicons, Pinkie Pie and Gauge's cooking show is interrupted by Shockwave, Fluttershy and Discord's tea-time is interrupted by Soundwave and his cassettes, Rainbow Dash and Windblade race while they battle some Seekers, and Insecticons attack the Apple family farm.

The frame is perfunctory but necessary; I did like that it opens by highlighting the absurdity of it all and also downplaying the continuity issues. (From the Transformers side, it seems to take place in the 1980s G1 continuity, but later characters like Windblade and Gauge are present; the Transformers wiki informs me there's not really a place in the MLP chronology it can fit, either.) The weaker stories don't really do much other than have a pony team up with an Autobot and mouth some platitudes about friendship. The only one I didn't like was the Apple family one, which didn't do anything clever or interesting.

from Transformers/My Little Pony #2
(script by Ian Flynn, art by Sara Pitre-Durocher)

But when it hits, it really hits. The Spike/Grimlock story might make no sense (how did Spike and Grimlock get to Earth?) but makes up for it with some delightful inanity as Spike saves the day by reading Modern Cybertronian for Everyday Conversations well enough to understand Teletraan I for Dummies, which he then reads well enough to reprogram the Ark's engines to use them as weapons against the Constructicons-- all seemingly in the matter of moments! I always like some good Grimlock jokes, and this has some great ones. (On top of this, my toddler liked it. He often sees me reading comics, or pulls one of my wife's MLP comics off the shelf, and asks to be read them, but gets bored after just a couple pages. But when I read him this story, he sat all the way through it and then asked for it again multiple times over the next couple days. And then a month later, I was reading The Transformers Classics UK and told him Grimlock was in it, and he started talking about "Grimlock and neigh-neighs," so clearly it left an impression!)

The Pinkie Pie/Gauge one has its moments, but the best of them all was the one about Fluttershy and Discord coming up against Soundwave. Soundwave's cassette robots all transform into animals, so Fluttershy tries to befriend them... this leads to a delightful moment where one clarifies that Ravage doesn't have a "boo-boo," he has "battle damage"... but then Fluttershy wins him over by applying "boo-boo creme" to it. At the same time, Discord turns all the animals in Fluttershy's sanctuary into Transformers in order to battle Soundwave, and in the end, Soundwave goes AWOL to spend time basking in friendship in Equestria.

from Transformers/My Little Pony #3
(script by James Asmus, art by Jack Lawrence)

There are some crossovers you can take seriously, I suppose, but a crossover like this doesn't deserve to be taken seriously. Or, indeed, benefit from it. Thankfully, the writers here largely understand that and make the best of it. I didn't really care about the plot-- but I don't think anyone involved expected me to. The end promises a sequel with the ponies in the Transformers universe, and if they make it, I will tell my comic book guy to put it in my pull box!

Friendship in Disguise! was originally published in issues #1-4 of Transformers/My Little Pony (July-Nov. 2020). The story was written by James Asmus (#1, 3-4), Ian Flynn (#1-2, 4), and Sam Maggs (#2-3); illustrated by Tony Fleecs (#1, 4), Jack Lawrence (#1, 3), Sara Pitre-Durocher (#2, 4), Casey W. Coller (#2), and Priscilla Tramontano (#3); colored by Tony Fleecs (#1), Lauren Perry (#1, 4), Luis Antonio Delgado (#1, 3), and Joana Lafuente (#2, 4); lettered by Jake M. Wood and Neil Uyetake; and edited by Megan Brown.

Review: Transformers: Lost Light: Crucible by James Roberts, Jack Lawrence, Brendan Cahill, et al.

The Lost Light might have accomplished the goal of their quest (kind of) in The Everlasting Voices, but that doesn't mean the story was over. There's still the mysterious Grand Architect out there, and what were Drift's visions of, and hey, doesn't Getaway still control the Lost Light? All that and more needs to be reckoned with in Crucible, which at six parts is I think the longest story in the history of More than Meets the Eye/Lost Light.

It's one of those stories that at times becomes too epic for its own good. The best MtMtE storylines turned on the characters: okay, so Overlord was in the basement and wasn't that neat, but what really made his attack noteworthy was the way all the characters reacted to it, and the emotions that engendered in the reader. Crucible is pretty epic, and it has a lot of answers to provide, but the questions weren't ones I was particularly burning to know. Like who is the Grand Architect? It turns out I didn't particularly care; the characters are what carried me through all these issues, not the mythology.

So the best moments of Crucible are those based on character. Rodimus finally getting his showdown with Getaway, but then stepping into the flames to rescue him and being restored to his original paintjob in the process was an awesome moment. Megatron making his comeback from the Functionist universe, having spent centuries trying to redeem himself but still feeling unredeemed was a perfect use of the character, especially when he reconciles with Rodimus and Ultra Magnus (who previously thought Megatron bailed on them).

The second-best moment of the whole story was probably when the crew splits up, and a whole group of different characters each have to open the Matrix of Leadership, which is morality locked. The group of characters selected to do this is great (Swerve, Tailgate, Ratchet, Nautica with Brainstorm, and so on), and the speech Rodimus gives to enable them to make the final pulls is heartwarming. I've grown to love these characters, and this was an excellent way for James Roberts to highlight that.

The best moment is the true revelation of what's the deal with Rung, but I won't spoil that for you here.

So those character moments are great, and there are some epic sequences, but I found the explanations behind the Grand Architect, the Warren, and all that jazz much less compelling than the character stuff it enabled. But compare this to some of the classic MtMtE stories, and I think the ratio of character-to-plot was better in those, probably because Roberts just had to get through so much plot in six issues. (I think Lost Light was originally supposed to last twice as long?)

There's also the final Lost Light story, "How To Say Goodbye and Mean It: Part 2." This is hard to talk about without spoiling, but I thought it was mostly spectacular. The story is set many years after Crucible, with the Lost Light crew reunited for the funeral of a friend. In dialogue and flashbacks, we learn what all the main characters have been up to in the intervening time: Rodimus and Minimus Ambus and Megatron and Brainwave and Nautica and Whirl and so on.

I'm a sucker for this kind of thing, and James Roberts does it very well, giving a mix of happy and tragic afterlives for these characters. This has been, after all, a series about damaged people, and "How To Say Goodbye" doesn't shy away from that. Some of these people never did get over the psychological effects of the war. There are tons of "awwwww....." moments here.

At the same time, I'm a sucker for those kind of endings that don't end, the kind of endings that just tell us "and the adventure continues!" The best part of this issue is that James Roberts comes up with a way to do that too. The story ends, but the story never ends.

On the day Lost Light #25 finally came out, I told my class I couldn't hang around after class because I had to get to the comic book store. "What are you going to do there?" one asked. "Buy comic books!" I answered. "So you don't have to get there," one said. I explained that I did because the final issue of a comic book series I really liked was coming out. They asked what it was, and I replied that it was a Transformers comic... and that I seriously, without sarcasm, believed it was one of the best comic books ever written.

I stand by that. Between them, More than Meets the Eye and Lost Light provided (arguably) one hundred issues of entertainment. In terms of building characters, creating tragedies, and telling jokes, I have never read a comic book series this good. It made me cry more than once, and made me laugh an absurd amount, too. It wasn't perfect, but I loved almost every issue of it. The whole reason I started reading IDW's Transformers comics was to get to More than Meets the Eye, because everything I had read about it told me I would like it. I did like it, and it was work well worth out.

This was a fitting ending, and I look forward to rereading the series at some point; I suspect it will be even better now that I'm better at reading Transformers comics, and now that I can understand all the hints about where it will go.

Next Week: Nothing! Be back whenever I get around to reviewing the digital collection of Unicron, which isn't out until March.

Crucible originally appeared in issues #19-24 of Transformers: Lost Light (June-Sept. 2018). The story was written by James Roberts; illustrated by E. J. Su (#19), Casey W. Coller (#20), Jack Lawrence (#21, 23), and Brendan Cahill (#22, 24); colored by Joana Lafuente; lettered by Tom B. Long; and edited by David Mariotte.

"How To Say Goodbye and Mean It: Part 2" originally appeared in issue #25 of Transformers: Lost Light (Oct. 2018). The story was written by James Roberts, illustrated by Jack Lawrence, colored by Joana Lafuente, lettered by Tom B. Long, and edited by David Mariotte.

Review: Transformers: Lost Light: The Everlasting Voices by James Roberts and Jack Lawrence

The quest of the Lost Light is at an end! Not because they've finally found what they're looking for... but because they're all dead. In The Everlasting Voices, Team Rodimus wakes up in the Afterspark, having died in compressed space when attempting to find medical assistance for a dying Ratchet. They're in a transitory phase, ready to join the Matrix once they accept their fates.

Or are they?

Of course they're not, but the story explores their different reactions to death. Rodimus is angry because he'll never confront Getaway; Ratchet the atheist doesn't believe they can be dead; Swerve is actually earnest for once in his life; Whirl is bored.

There are lots of great moments building on the characters James Roberts has established across umpteen previous issues. We have the mixed emotions of a Cyclonus/Tailgate reunion (sure, they're back together... but that means Tailgate died!), we have Whirl increasing signs of a conscience. Probably my favorite part is when Rodimus decides to confront God by whistling and shouting, "YO! Primus! Rodimus here. Long time face, first time caller." As Ultra Magnus moans, "if Rodimus was ever going to engage in a theological conversation, this is exactly how it would play out."

Yet, things have an undercurrent of seriousness; I liked that Rodimus summons Drift, Ratchet, and Ultra Magnus as his counsel before the Guiding Hand to have "[e]very base covered: faith, science, law." And then Rodimus actually grows up a little bit, the Guiding Hand getting him to admit recovering the Lost Light isn't about Getaway at all, but about the fact that it's "where [he's] happiest.... Because that's where everyone is happiest."

Similarly, Nightbeat is initially depressed he's never solved any of the universe's greatest mysteries. But then he does solve one of them, and ascends into the afterlife out of joy. Only once you learn what's really going on-- surprise, it's not the afterlife-- that means was initially was this joyous moment is actually a tragedy in disguise. It's a clever moment, not to mention good foreshadowing for the Crucible to come.

In the final issue, things come together extraordinarily. The Scavengers turn up, finally meeting Team Rodimus. Nautica figures out what's wrong with the afterlife. And then Rodimus figures out what's wrong with Cyberutopia. In a move that probably surprises no one, the quest of the Lost Light can never be accomplished, but the specific reason is pretty clever and unexpected. There's enough time for a few more nice character moments before the shit hits the fan in preparation for Crucible.

Quest stories often end with the realization that the journey itself was what mattered, more than the destination. It's a cliché, but that doesn't make it untrue, and The Everlasting Voices shows how true it is.

Next Week: Meanwhile, in the Benzene Cluster... it all comes to an end in a Crucible!

The Everlasting Voices originally appeared in issues #16-18 of Transformers: Lost Light (Mar.-May 2018). The story was written by James Roberts, illustrated by Jack Lawrence, colored by Joana Lafuente, lettered by Tom B. Long, and edited by David Mariotte.

Review: Transformers: Lost Light: The Plotters' Club by James Roberts, Jack Lawrence, Priscilla Tramontano, et al.

Issues #8-12 of Transformers: Lost Light (which roughly correspond to volume 2 of the collected editions) contain two stories, both kind of side stories but clearly also contributing to the long game of this comic book: a two-parter without an overarching title and a three-parter with two different ones.

"An Axe to Break the Ice" and "Chasing the Infinite" is about Nautica and Velocity going to a market planet, ostensibly for information, but actually because Nautica wants to bring Skids back to life; they're accompanied by new characters Anode and Lug, who get into hijinks of their own, before it all comes together. I wanted to like this more than I did. The problem is that the Nautica/Skids friendship and/or romance was never really at the forefront of More than Meets the Eye, so the depth of Nautica's grief never quite comes off. What does work, though, is the Nautica/Velocity friendship, which has been a strongly consistent element of these characters since they were introduced back in Dark Cybertron. The bigger plot elements here a little confusing, but I assume they'll become clear in time and/or the Transformers wiki will explain them to me.

The Plotters' Club takes us back to the Lost Light for the first time since Getaway stole it from Rodimus at the beginning of volume 10 of More than Meets the Eye; First Aid and the "Protectobots," who left the ship during Combiner Wars, finally make it back, only to discover there's been a change in management since they left. At first, things seem pretty chill-- under Getaway's leadership, the Lost Light is actually making progress-- but the longer they stay on board, the more suspicious things turn out...

This is another strong installment of MtMtE/Lost Light, undermined only by the fact that it focuses on some of the lesser characters, and I still find it difficult to distinguish unfamiliar robots from each other even after three years of reading Transformers comics. Like, when Ambulon came back, I wouldn't have known who he was without the TFWiki. But this is one of those James Roberts stories that blends interesting concepts, crazy antics, and chilling darkness into a coherent whole. The descent of Getaway into madness is fascinating, and I like seeing First Aid-- a guy I'd never given much thought to-- start to stand up to him. There are a lot of callbacks to earlier issues (Froid and Star Saber both return), and by and large they tend to work. It's another dozen-or-so issues before this series comes to an end, but things are clearly accelerating into the endgame at this point.

Also there are some good Thunderclash jokes, which I always appreciate.

Next Tuesday: Meanwhile, on Cybertron... the Dinobots are once again searching, this time for Salvation!

"An Axe to Break the Ice" and "Chasing the Infinite" originally appeared in issues #8-9 of Transformers: Lost Light (July-Aug. 2017). The story was written by James Roberts, illustrated by Priscilla Tramontano, colored by Joana Lafuente, lettered by Tom B. Long, and edited by Carlos Guzman.

The Plotters' Club (also known as The Mutineers Trilogy) originally appeared in issues #10-12 of Transformers: Lost Light (Sept.-Nov. 2017). The story was written by James Roberts; illustrated by Jack Lawrence (#10-12), Alex Milne (#11), and Andrew Griffith (#12); colored by Joana Lafuente (#10-12), Priscilla Tramontano (#11-12), and John-Paul Bove (#12); lettered by Tom B. Long; and edited by Carlos Guzman.

Review: Transformers: Lost Light: Dissolution by James Roberts, Jack Lawrence, et al.

As I worked my way through my digital More than Meets the Eye trades (mostly from Humble Bundle), I began to be convinced that 1) this was the best ongoing comic book there was, and 2) I didn't want it to be my fault if it was cancelled. Well, in a sense it already was cancelled, because after Revolution, it was relaunched as Lost Light, but the point stands. So I started subscribing to it in floppy format with August 2017's issue #9, hunting down the first eight issues as well. If it was cancelled, it wasn't going to be my fault. (As it turns out, by the point I finally got to reading Lost Light #1 in April 2018, it was announced that the series would be cancelled with September 2018's issue #25. Oh well.)

Lost Light picks up shortly after volume 10 of More than Meets the Eye, where various members of the Lost Light crew were stranded on the Necroworld after a ferocious battle with the Decepticon Justice Division... and then the planet exploded. Well, it turns out that the planet did not explode, but was instead shunted into an alternate universe, one created during the time travel shenanigans of volume 7. In this timeline, there is no Megatron, meaning that the Great War never happened... but instead the totalitarian Functionist Council eventually overthrew the Senate, turning Cybertron into an isolationist dystopia. "Team Rodimus" teleports to Cybertron only to find they're in this alternate world, and of course things go south quickly once they arrive.

A big part of the story resolves around Rung's apparent uselessness. Because no one know what Rung's alternate mode is for, he's an ideological thorn in the side of Functionists, who preach that every Cybertronian has one purpose and one purpose only. When Team Rodimus arrives on Cybertron, the Functionist Council claims they've finally figured out what Rung is for. To be honest, I didn't always follow this stuff, but the whole thing climaxes with a giant-sized Rung battling a moon, so I think it's pretty valid to say it worked for the awesomeness, and that's all I really require.

The real heart of the story in the Functionist universe is Megatron, still attempting to live up to his vow of pacifism, but now trapped in the horrors of a universe where he didn't start a war. At the end of the story, Megatron stays behind to lead the resistance against the Functionists. Megatron doesn't want to, though, showing the extent to which his time on the Lost Light really has changed him. He tells his friend Terminus, "If I stayed behind-- if I went back on my word-- I wouldn't be the person you think I am. And the person you think I am... that's the person I want to be." Terminus is someone Megatron hasn't seen since before the war, someone who never knew Megatron the monster. Terminus tricks Megatron into staying behind on the Functionist Cybertron; when Terminus claims Team Rodimus purposefully left Megatron behind, saying "They've given you a second chance," Megatron replies, "They'd already done that."

I was a Megatron-skeptic when he was introduced to More than Meets the Eye back in volume 6, but Dissolution shows how well he'd integrated himself into the series. I got chills with the line above, and in an earlier sequence, where Megatron expounds his new Autobot philosophy: "The opposite of Functionism isn't lack of Functionism. The opposite of Functionism is choice. It's about doing what you want-- regardless of what you were born to do, or what you're told to do, or what society expects you to do. No one can decide how to live your life except you." The second-last page, with Megatron lecturing to his new followers, is charming ("Peace through empathy."); the final page, where it seems like this might be the one reality where Megatron and Orion Pax can be friends, is heart-warming.

This was a satisfying end to the Megatron story. If he had ended up acquitted for his crimes because of a technicality like he'd originally planned, that would have beggared belief. But as told here, he genuinely comes around to the Autobot philosophy, and then is given an opportunity to put it into action. But I also like the tragedy that several of the Lost Light crew, in particular Rodimus and Ultra Magnus, end the storyline convinced Megatron never really did change, and was playing them the entire time. (Rodimus because of his own ego; Ultra Magnus because he can't stand ambiguity.) What was done with Megatron in season 2 of More than Meets the Eye and Dissolution shows the validity of IDW's approach to the Transformers universe. These are the stories you could only tell outside of the usual straightjacket of Autobots-versus-Decepticons, and they're all the better for it.

There's also a couple side plots about what's happening on Necroworld, which is mostly 1) the introduction of a new character, Anode, on whom I am currently agnostic, and 2) the deteriorating relationship Cyclonus and Tailgate. All the feels about the latter, of course; I look forward to seeing where both storylines go, as they're clearly more about setting up concepts for the run of Lost Light now that it's tied off some of the biggest plots of season 2 of More than Meets the Eye.

Next Tuesday: Meanwhile, on Cybertron... Windblade must fight evil giant robot zombies Till All Are One!

Dissolution originally appeared in issues #1-7 of Transformers: Lost Light (Dec. 2016–June 2017). The story was written by James Roberts, illustrated by Jack Lawrence, inked by John Wycough (#7), colored by Joana Lafuente (#1-7) and John-Paul Bove (#1), lettered by Tom B. Long, and edited by Carlos Guzman.