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Transformers Timelines: Dawn of Future's Past

Publisher: Fun Publications
Release date: November 2006 direct market release
Number of covers: One
Cover price: $4.99
Writer: Forest Lee, Pete Sinclair
Artwork: Dan Khanna, Alex Milne, Marcelo Matere and various
Rating: Art / Story

Characters: Tigatron, Unit 2, Scorponok, Megatron, Dinobot, Divebomb, Laserbeak, Buzzsaw, Airazor, Maximal council members, Rattrap, Cheetor, other Maximal crew members, Rhinox, Optimus Primal, Tarantulas, Waspinator, Terrorsaur, Rampage, Razorclaw, Tantrum, Headstrong

Synopsis:
By Stuart Denyer

Megatron may have been destroyed but Razorclaw has returned to rule.

Two members of the Maximal Command Security Force, one of whom we know to be Tigatron, respond to a call that a valuable artifact (named as the Golden Disk) is being stolen by armed intruders. Tigatron's squad mate is hit in crossfire and his transformation cog damaged, whilst Tigatron carries on the pursuit.

The intruders are Scorponok, Megatron and Dinobot. They've located the disk, and Megatron claims that he now holds destiny in his hands. When Dinobot demands that they stay and fight the responding Maximal forces, Megatron tells him that the bigger picture is being missed and manhandles him into leaving. Meanwhile, deep below the city surface, Divebomb contacts Laserbeak and Buzzsaw and orders them to ensure that Megatron's troops have located a capable ship to steal and are able to escape. He also warns them to keep their presence hidden, as the Maximals already suspect that Ravage (Tripredacus Agent) is involved in this somehow.

Above, Megatron and the other rendezvous with Terrorsaur and Waspinator on a ship that's been newly named the Darksyde. Tigatron is still in pursuit, and after some flirting commandeers a vessel piloted by Airazor. Elsewhere in the Maximal Defense Command Center, three shadowy figures take stock of the situation... the Predacon Tripredacus Council deny involvement, and the Darksyde is capable of transwarp jumping to evade pursuit. They make plans to route the Axalon, crewed by Optimus Primal's Maximals, to intercept... with some reservations about the unusual cargo the ship is already carrying on another covert mission for them.

The Axalon is en route for the Alpha Quadrant to deposit that, when they're briefed on the Predacon criminals. Before they can change course, they're attacked by Laserbeak and Buzzsaw, taking them temporarily offline, then saved by the arrival of Tigatron and Airazor (with the two Decepticons apparently being destroyed with their ship, but the intercepting Maximals also taking heavy fire.) Rhinox ends up transferring the damaged spark cores of their rescuers into protoforms.

Elsewhere, Tarantulas reports to the Tripredacus Council, and has succeeded in decoding the coordinates for Earth from the Golden Disk. The Axalon catches up with the Darksyde just as it's about to transwarp jump, with Dinobot again being smacked down by Megatron for not wanting to retreat. Megatron contacts Primal and stalls for time, before executing a jump and taking us into the first episode of Beast Wars.
http://bwtf.com/bw/tvshow/episodes/seasonone/beastwars/partone

In an epilogue (set after both Beast Wars and Beast Machines) Divebomb explains to a newly-returned Razorclaw that Megatron was ultimately destroyed, but that the Decepticon cause and destiny is now back on track. Razorclaw agrees whilst posing dramatically.

******

Comments:

Declaration of bias... I got this as a review copy from OneShallStand. I don't think that'll affect the review much, I just mention it because I wouldn't have bought this myself on the basis of previews -- I gave the recent Beast Wars miniseries from IDW a try out of goodwill towards the company and curiosity, rather than because I consider myself a big fan of this strand of Transformers.

The story was originally released without supplementary material at BotCon (the official Hasbro-endorsed Transformers convention) earlier this year. BotCon is now operated by Fun Publications/Master Collector after the previous convention licensees went bust, and this is their first foray with Transformers into direct market comics. The actual story title for Timelines #1 is "Dawn of Futures Past", and as the cover says it's a prequel to Beast Wars -- specifically the TV show.

Writing duties are shared by Forest Lee (Hasbro staff writer) and Pete Sinclair (longterm fan active in previous BotCons) with Bob Forward (Beast Wars show writer) and Ben Yee (professional Beast Wars fan and all-round good egg) acting as consultants. From the start, Fun Publications are making the right nods to cause as little fandom controversy as possible as they go about adding to the Beast Wars show universe, and I've yet to see any viciously negative feedback online.

There are three artists credited on the story, whose pages hang together quite comfortably. Most problems to be seen are with the first artist -- it looks like Dan Khanna's work -- whose angles on Tigatron in car mode are dodgy and who looks to have freehand drawn some parts of his pages that called for straight lines. The colourist (Drew Eiden, if they're credited in order) manages to compensate for it, mostly. In any case, the art tells the story clearly and improves as the issue goes on... the last page being in line with the standard set on the cover by Joe Ng, whose work here is more polished and proportional than anything he did with Dreamwave.

Does this fit with IDW's "Beast Wars: The Gathering" series? Well, there's nothing directly contradictory as far as I can see, and since Ben Yee is also onboard as a consultant with the Beast Wars profile series IDW have planned, I imagine things will continue forward in this fashion. The story itself packs a lot in, rather like the current TF: Spotlight comics, and I found it surprisingly enjoyable just on that basis. It's nothing particularly revolutionary, but much more effort appears to have gone into the plotting than might be expected from a comic existing not in small part to showcase the exclusive remoulds and repaints that were a selling point of the 2006 convention.

Characterisation is decent, as you'd expect with the pedigree of the writing team. The voices from what episodes of Beast Wars I've seen fitted smoothly with the dialogue, and none of the characters do anything jarring or out-of-place. There's foreshadowing of Airazor and Tigatron's later relationship in the show (I hate gender role analogues in my TF fiction, but at least they're applied consistently in Beast Wars) and a reasonable explanation supplied for them being brought back online on Earth minus some memories and faculties, squeezed into a text-heavy single panel of technobabble.

On the other hand there's a very noticeable lack of names used in-story, which I assume is because monikers such as Tigatron, Cheetor, Tarantulas and Dinobot would sound much sillier when applied to robots who don't turn into the associated animals. It creates a situation where Airazor's ship gets namechecked (as "the Chromia", after an original series femmebot) but only Primal, Megatron and a handful of 'Generation One' throwback characters are actually introduced; anyone who doesn't have a good memory for the Beast Wars cast may feel quite lost as they're flicking through this. That wouldn't be an problem for the same story as read by a convention audience, but considering it's been given a general release it wouldn't have hurt or been hard to keep things more accessible.

As with most things associated with the fanclub the issue is expensive for what it is, counterpoint being that it's aimed at a niche audience and economies of scale aren't available to the producers. (From their perspective, even if a direct market release only covers costs, it'll be an advert for their organisation and convention.) But I'd say that if you followed the TV show closely enough to recognise the events mentioned in passing -- the Axalon's secret cargo of Protoform X, who Tarantulas is reporting to, Ravage, etc. -- you'll most likely appreciate this for sketching in backstory.

What you may appreciate less is the suggestion that Beast Wars Megatron was steered into his impressive later career as a megalomaniacal soul-eating villain by five fairly unremarkable original series bad guys, the 1980s Predacons. I also won't be surprised if this is the first step towards a subsequent year's convention exclusive toys, and that feels a bit cheapening... then again, you could argue that Beast Wars is already riddled with original series characters and happenings: Starscream, Ravage, time-travel in The Agenda, the Golden Disk being encoded with the original Megatron's message...

After the story is a page of pre-comic sketches by Marcelo Matere (who'll be seen on a Soundwave spotlight issue for IDW next year) of Waspinator, Terrorsaur, Megatron in robot mode and a jet. Then there are profile pages in the style of Dreamwave's MTMTE profile series for Optimus Primal and Megatron, the latter gaining an additional alt-mode to the one suggested by the "tank suit" he's wearing in the main story.

Renderings by Trent Troop follow, giving a brief profile for Cheetor and reusing the CGI a few times to bulk out the ranks of the Maximal Command Security Force. Finally, there are adverts for two club exclusive toys (Astrotrain and Airazor) and the second half of Transformers Armada season one on DVD.

All in all, an entertainingly thorough one-shot that does a better job than most convention comics of introducing some toy exclusives and has some wider appeal.

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