Transformers Classics Vol. 1 Kindle & comiXology

I love both the US & especially the UK Transformers comics. First off, let me say that Marvel in general makes the best comics ever. X-Men, Avengers, Fantastic Four Iron Man; the list goes on. Even some of the toy based ones were great. Besides the obvious suspect, I also loved Micronauts & Rom. They all continue to entertain me to this day. While the US Transformers comic was spotty at times there were still some very good issues. But when Furman came along, it was nothing but awesome, all the way through Generation 2. I have to admit that overall I think it’s better than the cartoon, especially when you include the UK issues. Although I think season 2 of the show represents the high point of 80s animation (as well as at least two-thirds of season 3), the comic lasted longer than the show & got to handle more characters which made it a little more interesting. And I have to admit that while the first season is good on its own, I like the first twelve issues of the comic a bit better. A few episodes presented a better debut for certain characters. Heavy Metal War was significantly better than issue #10 of the comic (though that issue was good too), and Jetfire’s origin was much better in the cartoon, even if he was called Skyfire. But aside from 2 or 3 more episodes those are really the only better parts of the first season. I love everything about the first 12 issues. The characters all get a better introduction than in More Than Meets The Eye, especially the cassettes. I find it really interesting that Ravage, Laserbeak & Buzzsaw (& later Ratbat) can talk as opposed to only speak in animal noises. And they should too. Their tech specs all have quotes, and how could they have quotes if they couldn’t talk? I wonder what Laserbeak & Buzzsaw would have sounded like, but to this day I always use Ravage’s Beast Wars voice when reading his lines in the comic. Ratchet & Shockwave are also significantly cooler in the comic. In the cartoon, Shockwave was just another of Megatron’s loyal followers while in the comic he fights him for leadership (believing himself to be the most logical choice for leader, which is closer to his tech spec) & beats him. And while Ratchet never got much of a spotlight in the cartoon, he got a really good one in issues 7 & 8. But the biggest improvement over the cartoon as a whole (apart from lasting longer) is the Dinobots. In the second season they were always cool, but in the first season their stupidity was a little annoying at times. Here though they are smarter and they come from Cybertron (which makes them more interesting than being built on Earth as it lead to one of my favorite UK stories, Grudge Match) & got their forms because their ship was scanning the inhabitants of the Savage Land. That’s another nice little bonus I wish we could’ve seen more of, interactions with the Marvel universe. Ah well at least we got a crossover with Spider-Man. And I don’t care what anyone says, these stories all take place in my ideal Marvel Universe (the Transformers & G.I. Joe cartoons were technically produced by Marvel, & that’s good enough for me). Really, I have nothing but praise for the first 12 issues. The only nitpicks I have are that Buster & Jessie aren’t quite as cool as Spike & Carly, & I wish that Sparkplug had eventually opened up to the Autobots, but I guess I’ll just have to write fanfiction to fill in the gaps (though I was very glad when they brought Spike in later). Sadly there is one real flaw in this volume, in that it does not end on a good story. I’m not superstitious but 13 was a really unlucky number for this comic. The story Shooting Star is about a loser who happens to find a mentally damaged Megatron in gun form & uses him to make grand robberies. It’s not the only subpar story Budiansky would write but it is by far the worst. Bob, we buy the Transformers comics for the giant robots, not the people they happen to meet. If you were so bothered by Hasbro asking you to keep throwing in new toys maybe you could have used this issue to spread it out a bit more. But still he did a good job overall, even with some of the later ones (especially the Headmasters miniseries).Overall this is a must-read. This is easily the best of the Transformers Classics without any stories by Simon Furman in them. To be honest while the next 9 issues are good, with a couple exceptions they pale in comparison to the second season of the cartoon (I honestly like to use my imagination of what happened after this & some tweaking of the dialogue here & there to get the series to the point where it’s compatible with the second season), but starting with issue 23 it does get great again, for a little while at least. The next couple volumes are overall a bit spotty, but there’s still some good to be found. For further details, stay tuned for more reviews.

When I was growing up, I had some but not all of the early Marvel comics. I had managed to collect issues 6, 7, 9-13 from this volume. Now, after many years, I can finally go back and read it from the beginning. To be honest though, the early TF comics really weren't good at all. The Transformers were poorly drawn, with very blocky shapes, and it was extremely wordy. The art wasn't all bad though. In particular issues 7-8 by William Johnson and the following issues from Herb Trimpe were very well illustrated. The Don Perlin issues - not so much. It's interesting seeing some of the minor characters play more prominent roles in the early issues, especially Buzzsaw and Frenzy. It's also funny to see Ratchet and Ironhide looking like their toy designs in the early issues, before they started looking more like their cartoon robot incarnations. Early on, the writers felt the constant need to remind us of the TF special powers such as Thundercracker's sonic boom or Frenzy's high frequency noise making ability. Like the cartoon, the main preoccupation of the TF's is the constant need for energy! Issues 1-4 are dominated by the fact that everyone is low on gas and needs to power up! It's practical, but it's also kind of boring and unimaginative. Thankfully, things improved once Bob Budiansky took over as the main writer. He created an early story arc that was unbelievably dark compared to the cartoon, in which most of the autobot characters were deactivated and Optimus reduced to just a head. His writing wasn't always great, and some of his stories were silly and dumb (issue #13, as well as Robot Master from the next volume), but when he was on his game, he created some excellent stories. His portrayal of the Decepticons turned out to be far more entertaining and interesting when compared to their Autobot counterparts. Soundwave and Shockwave in particular were more vocal and assertive. In the cartoon, Soundwave is very passive and Shockwave is just kind of pathetic and useless. Starscream is still sneaky and manipulative, wanting to become the leader, but he isn't as vocal about it compared to the cartoon. I enjoyed the humor as well. Like when Megatron blasts Starscream for saying something disloyal and tells his comrades to "Add Starscream to the damaged list!" Or when Rumble has to sweat out his "punishment" from Shockwave for letting a human sneak by him.Overall a very enjoyable journey back to the TF universe even for me as a grown man who is now passing on my love of TF to my young son. I hope to get the rest of the kindle comics as they are so low priced, but it seems volume 4 skips most of the issues from the 30's, which is quite regrettable.

This is a great collection of the earliest issues of the Transformers. It is a must own for fans because it goes into so much more detail than the animated series ever did. The animation is good for animation of that period and gets even better as it goes along, and the story telling is even better. Unfortunately these volumes are going for 45 bucks or sometimes more. If you intend on getting all eight like I am that can get very VERY expensive. While a big physical copy may be nice to have to flip through, the books are heavy and are very easily damaged and aside from some hardcover runs they were mostly sold as paper back. Way too big and with way too thin a cover and they get damaged easy.That's why I opted for the digital Kindle version and to purchase it rather than subscribe to a service. I like being able to download it and carry it with me anywhere and read and enjoy parts wherever I am even if I have no data or wifi available. I still support printed media especially comic book media and we all need to do our part on that and buy physical copies as well, but for a situation like this with a big cumbersome volume, it is a perfect solution. It is just too big a volume to carry around all the time. If the pictures are not big enough you can use a tablet and it's just like holding a full size copy in your hands. Amazing early adventures of Optimus Prime and all the gang collected together. If you like Transformers or Sci-fi at all, I strongly urge you to ready these. They will provide hours and hours of enjoyment.

First a note as to what is actually contained in this volume as the marketing blurb is just plain wrong. This is a reprint of the first 13 issues of the Marvel (US) Transformer series which started in 1984. UK readers will recognise these as they all appeared in early issues of our comic too.On to the quality of the collection. Unlike previous Classics reprints, there are no issues missed here - IDW and Marvel have sorted out their licensing quibbles so that characters like Spiderman and Circuit Breaker no longer cause anything to be missed. Also different is the colouring - gone are the dot matrix grids, replaced by solids. This doesn't really improve the look in my view - these are old comics, and I'd prefer them to look as they did originally. The solid colours give everything a rather flat look and highlight any problems with the artwork. It's not a dealbreaker however. The cover is embossed and it's a fairly handsome trade paperback. There is a new two page introduction and three small notes highlighting trivia on a few of the comics - these are fine but more could certainly have been done from an editorial standpoint. The covers of each issue are reproduced.As for the content itself, it's aged a bit but not as badly as I expected. These were written to sell toys and for the first four issues it really shows as both writer and artist struggle to breathe life into the robot characters. Credit is due though for establishing the Transformers mythology. When Budiansky gets hands on with scripting duties things start to improve. These comics could easily have been terrible given the huge roster of toys to sell, but he quickly focuses on a few and isn't afraid to build up an overarching plot between many issues - something that kept me hooked as a kid. Included here are Shockwave's grand entrance, the plight of Ratchet as last remaining Autobot, and the return of Prime and Megatron after long absences. There isn't a settled artistic team, and some people get to grips with the subject better than others (William Johnson in Warrior School is the first to get the Bots to show some kind of emotion) however it's passable for the most part. They stand up OK for what they are, and if you are buying as a Transformers fan, or just to indulge in nostalgia, then you'll enjoy them again. I wouldn't recommend them to a neutral reader of course.Finally, if you want a copy of this I wouldn't hang about. IDW has a terrible record of keeping stuff in print, and Amazon UK seem useless at getting much stock - use a reliable Marketplace seller or order directly from Amazon.com rather than wait.

With the recent Michael Bay films proving to be huge blockbuster hits now is the perfect time to revisit these old comics from the 80's. For something that started off as just an advert to sell toys, there has actually been a lot of thought and plot put into these comics full of great characters and even set in the Marvel Universe with guest appearance from Spiderman and cameo from Nick Fury in one issue. A lot of fun to read though i suspect this book will simply appeal to fans only with fond memories of the original comics or fans of the new films curious to see where it all started but if you are a fan then these comics are pretty much as i remember from the 80's and will no doubt love. Graphic novel contains the first 12 issues and sees the arrival from the Transformers home planet Cybertron.

Bought this book out of nostagia for the Transformers comic I used to get as a child - certainly a superior incarnation than the current films.The book comes with a bit of background about how it came to be created, which is quite interesting.Credit is deserved for creating an interesting plot around something which could have been seen as a cynical marketing exercise.Did find I got tired of the constant changing of the characters eventually, but the comics did have a good run and there were some exciting stories with clever ideas.

This New Collection Of The US Comics Is, In My Opinion, The Best Version To Start Collecting.The Artwork Has Been Beautifully Restored Throughout And Is Much Better Than The Previous Release Of This Collection. Also, The Price Is A Lot More Reasonable Than The Price Of The Previous Hardback Versions (I Managed To Buy My Copy For Less Than £15, A Real Bargain!)Another Plus For This New Release Is That You Get More Issues Of The US Comics In One Volume Which Is An Improvement On The Previous Release Which Had Less Stories Per Volume.I Shall Be Investing In These New Collections In Future. Well Done IDW!

Loved this book.