Titan's Transformers UK reprints

[El Chuxter]

There's a TF thread in here somewhere, which hasn't been updated in over a year, and which deals with the tripe Dreamwave put out, so I'd rather give this the credit it deserves.

I just discovered that Titan Books has not only reprinted the entire run of the US Transformers series (minus apparently the Headmasters miniseries, which I couldn't find), but is in the process of reprinting the UK series as well!!

This is excellent news for fans of the big robots. The original comics series has always been, for me at least, the only true "canon" Transformers tales. While Marvel UK's (weekly?) series was heavy on the reprints of the American stories, there were a large number of new stories, primarily by Transformers god Simon Furman, that filled in a lot of gaps in the American series. And, when Furman took over the American series with issue 56, there were a lot of references to his run on the UK series.

It will take me quite some time to accumulate all of these and read them, but I can't wait to find out. . .

• More on the origin of Primus and Unicron
• What those crazy things were that ate the Battlechargers and claimed to be the original Cybertronians
• What Grimlock and the Dinobots were up to between the time they went AWOL and when Grimlock appointed himself Autobot King
• Why Megatron was the only Transformer who didn't seem to recognize an alternate-future Galvatron in the present day
• How Dreadwind and Darkwing were able to ditch the Mecannibals, come under Megatron's command, and retrieve the shattered body of Starscream
• What the Deathbringer was, how it got the Matrix, and why Optimus Prime didn't retrieve the Matrix then rather than sending teams across the galaxy a few years later
• How Grimlock and the other Actionmasters were able to regain the ability to transform prior to the Generation 2 comic
• What went down when Optimus Prime and Grimlock actually went one-on-one, and if this is the reason Grimlock suddenly respects Prime during Furman's run
• Exactly how much butt Andrew Wildman can kick when drawing Transformers

Most of all, I look forward to completing the entire story, then reading it all in chronological order. (It's a rare case of having a favorite story, finishing it, then finding out ten years later that you only have half of it.)

This probably isn't going to be a hotbed of discussion here, but I thought any other TF fans who weren't aware of this would appreciate the knowledge.

[Bel-Cam Jos]

This probably isn't going to be a hotbed of discussion here, but (blah... blah... blah)

Then, I shall close this thread, labeling it LOA. Lack of interest. I mean, it's been over 24 hours now!

[Dominic Guglieme]

I am subscribing to this thread.


That being said, the US and UK continuity was often contrary to itself. And, as with any long running (weekly no less) comic, there were ups and downs to the quality. But, from what I have read, many of the old TF UK comics were worth reading.

I will sign on for this, as it will be nice to get everything in one consistent format. Hopefully, they will remember to reprint "Man of Iron" this time around.

[El Chuxter]

That being said, the US and UK continuity was often contrary to itself. And, as with any long running (weekly no less) comic, there were ups and downs to the quality.

Man, no kidding! I got the first four--the manga-sized collections--in the mail today: Aspects of Evil, Way of the Warrior, Earthforce, and Perchance to Dream. These stories somewhat almost just about but not quite jive with American continuity.

So apparently the Time Wars (alluded to a few times herein) took place immediately after Starscream acquired the Underbase (US #47-50). So it appears that Carnivac and Snarler survived the Time Wars, took on a job for Scorponok to gain their Pretender shells (presumably the botched hit on Spike Witwicky from US #51), and then Carnivac turned traitor and joined Earthforce under Grimlock. Only, uh, Grimlock was killed by Starscream and not revived until Ratchet was kidnapped by Megatron and restored both of them (and Jazz and Bumblebee) to life with Pretender technology (US #56-58). Speaking of whom, Megatron seems to be the big villain in the Earthforce issues, but he should be hiding on Cybertron, believed to be dead. And before founding Earthforce, Grimlock has just revived the Dinobots (and a footnote says to see "an upcoming US story" for details), and that doesn't take place until he goes AWOL and finds the source of nucleon. . . and then comes back to find the Ark abandoned, as Primus has summoned the Transformers back to Cybertron, minus a few stragglers scattered across the universe.

Or how Galvatron (I assume the one from the dystopian 2007, whom Unicron brings to the early 90s to serve as his herald, as he says he's not the Galvatron from the Time Wars) tries to overtake several dead Autobot warriors on the abandoned Ark. . . except that he was brought to the past, sent to Cybertron, and double-crossed Unicron immediately before Grimlock revived said warriors with nucleon.

Overall, major continuity farts aside, several enjoyable stories, and a couple of slower ones. It was nice to finally know what Deathbringer was, even though I for some reason thought he'd be a much bigger threat than he was. And the resolution of the Mecannibals story arc was quite cool, with them being treated as comic relief. . . and the bar from the Visual Dictionary shows up, as well!

[Dominic Guglieme]

Point of information: "Man of Iron", which was reprinted as part of the original US run has not been reprinted at all by Titan. Ironically, this is one of the best TF arcs of all time. Solid writing, and consistent, if stylistic art.

The black and white stories mentioned above were more drafts than anything else. After all, there is reference to nucleon and Action Masters in several of the stories (most notably proxy Devastator). And, the Autobots seem to rely heavily on outside transport. Of course, none of these stories can reconcile with late run US comics.

[El Chuxter]

I was really wondering about the Devastator construct, especially when one of the 'Bots comments that the Constructicons can no longer form Devastator. My first thought was "ActionMaster," but so many other plot elements seem to place these tales somewhere in the early US #50s--before Hasbro had even dreamt up the ActionMasters. Especially when one considers the stories in conjunction with Way of the Warrior, which mentions Earthforce and has to fall into the short window of time after Carnivac gained his Pretender shell and before Bludgeon became leader of the Mayhem Attack Squad. (Not to mention pretty much every character in these arcs was also quite dead at the time.)

If it were ActionMasters, and these took place after #80 (which doesn't jive with the original UK issue numbers, either), there's the problem of Mindwipe and the Battlechargers being alive (both clearly seen biting it in #75).

I didn't lose too much sleep over this, though, and quickly decided that these are mostly fun little stories that absolutely cannot fit in continuity. However, the Arcee origin story at the end of Earthforce I consider to be the canon origin of the character in the movie continuity.