
Artist and colorist Josh Burcham updates our February 2021 solicitations coverage with a closer look at his Transformers Beast Wars issue #1 cover A:
There’s so much I wish I could show you from the book but til then enjoy a little look at my process in creating the cover for Beast Wars #1!
Join in the discussion about this upcoming series on the 2005 boards!
Creator credits: Erik Burnham (Author), Josh Burcham (Artist, Cover Artist), Fico Ossio (Cover Artist), Dan Schoening (Cover Artist), Nick Brokenshire (Cover Artist)
Celebrating 25 years of Beast Wars! In the future, the planet Cybertron belongs to the scientific-minded Maximals and the action-oriented Predacons! When a crew of Predacons, led by the successor to the Megatron name, steal a golden disk and a ship capable of traveling through time, it’s up to Optimus Primal and his Maximal crew – Rattrap, Rhinox, Cheetor, and new character Nyx – to catch them! A brand-new Beast era begins in an oversized first issue by Erik Burnham (Ghostbusters, Transformers/Ghostbusters) and Josh Burcham (Transformers, Transformers Galaxies), yesssss!
pretzillusprime
i am getting a very animated vibe from the art style and i LOVE it
decepticonaiden
Nice! I'll put it on my list
T-Hybrid
I think the 2nd of 3rd.
decepticonaiden
So, this comes out in February, right? Any word on a specific date?
IronWaveJRG
I feel that if Nyx gets transmetalized, she's more than likely going to be an adaptation of Sonar's design, rather than just becoming Sonar
TriBlurr
Well. Just added a subscription to comixology. Haven't bought a comic in quite awhile.
Looking forward to it.
T-Hybrid
Or Sonar shows up later when TM2s pop up and it's her sister or friend or something from the Ark.
On the show (and I think the toy bios) TM2 was Megatron's experimenting with cloning. Fleshing that out with him collecting pods in an attempt to build an army would be a neat way to do more with the concept.
CelticMutt
I'm going to laugh if it turns out Nyx is just a pre-TM2 Sonar, and she changes her name due to the trauma or something. And is she isn't, who cares as long as she's a good character?
misternewuzer
I feel silly, but where are people finding these pages? I'd like to check out the preview and see what the fuss is about!
Wild Eevee
In greek mythology Nyx is the goddess of night.
Earthshock
Why the harping on Sonar? BW bat named Nyx? Looks based on the Primal bat mold? Is that short for Onyx? So obvious I assume it's probably been brought up and I just missed it over all the arguing. I freely admit I only skimmed.
Scarlet knight
You never know. Old characters may show up later.
T-Hybrid
What seems unreasonable is that we're having this conversation now when we haven't even gotten the first issue and not like a year in when we actually see how the roster may differ from the original.
And over *one* new character in an otherwise 1:1 original roster.
All while the Tripredacus Council is right there already rather than shuffled off to a one-off appearance at the end of "season 2."
To me that's setting a good tone. The Council is a pretty big Chekov's gun to just throw it out there and never revisit.
Single Elegant Machine
It's nice to see some references to Beast Machines here, even if it's only visual.
dj_convoy II
I don't think it's unreasonable to want one of the HUGE amount of unused BW characters to be utilized (a la Swerve or Tailgate) as opposed to making up a new character. Wanting preexisting characters used who never had a chance due to the nature of the original Beast Wars show (A CGI show with a very limited budget) to be used isn't some kind of whiny, do everything the same argument. It's not a deal breaker for me, but I totally understand why some folks side eye new characters.
T-Hybrid
There are people in here who want Nyx to be Sonar who were *furious* over the paint jobs and alt modes of the 2016 Botcon set because they were vehicle modes despite the FunPub continuity up until that point affirming that prior to Earth everyone in the BW cast were vehicles before that.
And that was even knowing FunPub's limitations around mold/character use.
The fact this appears for now to be a somewhat remixed version of the original story compared to what we saw in the previous IDW series (especially Lost Light) is already a massive bit of fannservice.
They could have done Beast Wars on modern Earth amd they're all accurate to the size of their alt mode. Now *that* would have been a shake up.
Olivus Prime
FunPub's tendency to include incessant callbacks to old toys/characters when they weren't needed got on my nerves, so I'm looking forward to a comic that will hopefully be more or less a blank slate. Though homages make up such a huge proportion of modern franchise fiction, so there will probably be fanservice to some extent.
T-Hybrid
It's especially ironic with Beast Wars, where if HasTak had gone with their first plan would have just been a bunch of G1 guys in new organic bodies and we'd have gotten *none* of the now iconic BW cast.
Also, I just realized people are getting their wish because the Tripredacus Council is in issue 1. Which means they're already being used more than they were in the original series.
And also probably means they'll have a bigger role in this.
Olivus Prime
This fandom's lack of awareness for artistic invention is staggering sometimes. Particularly for, and I'm aware this has been said many times, a franchise named "Transformers".
Lore Keeper
Cheetor transforms very differently from Transmetal Cheetor, who transforms very differently from Transmetal 2 Cheetor, who in turn transforms very differently than either of them. Yet, their silhouettes are very different from each other whereas both Nyx and Sonar go for the gargoyle look.
I get what you're saying about characters like Getaway or someone like Star Saber. The problem with them is, you can only stretch a concept so far. Not many will complain about minor changes to a character or their background. Was Orion Pax a dock worker, an archivist, a cop, or a senator? But turn Star Saber into a genocidal maniac, and people feel completely confused and cut off from a familiar face. Unless there's a planned plot twist where Nyx/Sonar turns out to be a murderous agent for the Tripredacus Council who eats the corpses of her victims, I don't think people will be too upset if her self-consciousness from one line of her tech specs doesn't translate over.
As far as Razorbeast, is there a story there I haven't heard of? Did people not like him in The Awakening or something? Genuinely asking. I wasn't on the forums when that came out.