With today marking the release of Unicron issue 6 – the penultimate part of the IDW Transformers continuity – and nary a word on the mooted reboot, you might legitimately be asking what IDW will be doing to fill the impending gap for giant robots in their comic lineup. The answer is apparently Go-Bots. Penned by Tom Scioli of Transformers VS G.I. Joe fame, this series presents a revival and alternate take on the age-old rivals to the Transformers toys. Gone is the Saturday morning derring-do heroism of Leader-1 and his human friends – in its place we have a mission which could start World War III and a Leader-1 who would like permission to use lethal force. The old arm blasters are present here though – or at least they’re interpreted as machine guns in Leader-1’s knuckles.
It’s a new and different take on the series that was an 80s rival to Transformers, and one that has seen countless riffs and references in Transformers media over the years – lest we forget the times Megatron murdered Cy-Kill or the time Leader-1 was Megatron’s Mini-Con. Here though is a new version of the original Go-Bots – check out the preview on iTunes and see for yourself.
Digger
Is there any discussion open for the issues now that they’re out or does everyone just not care enough? Honestly I don’t blame you for thinking that.
G1Prowl
I don't recall every being on Tformers, so I'd say it was someone else unfortunately. I'll do my best to maintain the friendly vibe, though.
dCon
G1 Prowl! I remember you! You were always awesome & a good friend. You have/had same name at Tformers, right?? And I agree it is somewhat of a miserable identity.
primalxconvoy
One can dream.
G1Prowl
With the issues between Bandai and Hasbro sharing this nebulous ownership of the US version of the fiction and toys, I doubt we'll ever see anything unless it's a translated Machine Robo anime.
primalxconvoy
Me too! Please set the example by ceasing it forthwith!
Anyway, with that dealt with, does anyone think there will ever be some great media they finally does the Gobots franchise the service it deserves?
I also would love some great, mass produced official Gobots figures (with a Leader-1 that was a bit better than the recent offering).
G1Prowl
You know, I have a strong distaste for BW and TFA. You know what I don't do, though? Go into threads dedicated to them and shitpost.
SouthtownKid
This is at least hand lettered. But there's no excuse for the subpar lettering in all of IDW's other books.
primalxconvoy
More like "Sigh…Gobots…"
Haywired
Proudly continuing tradition of IDW subpar lettering, lolz.
RKillian
Looks like they rotated the Guardian/human teams. In the cartoon, it was Leader-1/Matt, Turbo/AJ, and Scooter/Nick. This "reimagining" has Leader-1/Nick, Turbo/Matt, and Scooter/AJ.
Gaastra
Yup alongside cy-kill yet the real cy-kill shows up later in his classic look. There is a turbo killed in one episode and another that shows up later. There are tons of buggys in the show. Some are killed! They draw the "people" of the world as gobots or humans and will reuse the same gobots over and over as townspeople. The turbo that's killed in that episode is not the same guy that shows up later. So "scooter" showing up more then once is not shocking. If it makes you feel better you could call the female one his sister.
G1Prowl
Am I the only one who'd like a Cy-Kill in that color?
Thundershot
I just realized we've got a Go-Bot / Machine Robo discussion and no sign of Scaleface…
justiceg
I'm reasonably sure that the latter wouldn't have actually seen the light of day in 80s Marvel/DC due to quality control so maybe this is an unfair comparison? (And I'm speaking as a dude who really liked TF vs Gi Joe)
Optimus Prime23
Nope, that’s not Scooter in Machine Robo. Scooter had a real brief appearance in Machine Robo here:
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Optimus Prime23
Or better yet, “I, Gobot”.
primalxconvoy
Arguably, the diminishing relevance of comics today and the increased competition for mindshare from other forms of entertainment.
Michael Payton
I read the original Transformers #1 when it was new after seeing the TV commercial for it and reading the preview in Marvel Age. I know vapid people think that they get to sit at the cool table if they rip on anything older than last Tuesday, but Mantlo, Springer and Budiansky did their jobs and made lifelong fans out of lots of kids. Like me. It also was selling around 300-400k a month for four or five years of its run. A major superhero has to be killed off or brought back from the dead with 200 variant covers to hit that number in 2018. This was an above average seller in the mid 1980s. If the new stuff is so much better than these comics, why does they all sell so freaking bad in comparison?
primalxconvoy
It would be great where both exist, especially if both were good. Alas, this is not the case.