Fico Ossio

Access a version of the below that includes illustrations on my blog.

I believe I previously compared IDW's Dark Cybertron crossover to Crisis on Infinite Earths, but Revolution is the real Crisis on Infinite Earths analogue. Cosmic threat, disparate groups of heroes, big status quo changes. Revolution crosses Transformers over with a set of Hasbro-properties-turned-IDW-comics, some preexisting, some made into comics for this event: G.I. Joe, Rom, M.A.S.K., Micronauts, Action Man. I think that's all of them. When I first read Crisis, I had only a dim notion of the world in which it took place; I was a DC comics neophyte. That's not too dissimilar from my reading of Revolution-- I know IDW's Transformers very well at this point, but G.I. Joe only from previous Transformers crossovers, Action Man from the tragically truncated Saturday morning cartoon of 2000 to 2001, and the rest not at all-- yet Crisis worked for me while Revolution didn't.

Part of this is intellectual and unfair. Crisis draws on its participants', well, conceptual weight. Historical weight? I dunno. You might not have actually read a Blue Beetle comic, but you know that Blue Beetle has a decades-long preexisting history when he turns up. You might not have read an Earth-3 story before, but you know that the Justice League has been there many times. And this even bleeds over into worlds newly established for Crisis, like Earth-6. But here, Rom and M.A.S.K. and Micronauts and Action Man... it's just like, why should I care? They were basically made up for this story, so seeing them in danger here has no effect. They have fifty days worth of history, not fifty years.

Related to this... these concepts don't seem all that good? Fifty years of evolution mean that every DC character to appear in Crisis had been refined and honed over the years. They were all good ideas... to some extent at least. But like M.A.S.K. is like Knight Rider times five or something? And Action Man is a man who is good at action? And the Micronauts are just small folks? Except they come from a universe where everything is small, so they're not really small in a meaningful way. Like, Transformers started out dumb, and still kind of is, but thirty years have allowed it to accrue some good concepts and ideas. I can't say the same for any of the other concepts here.

Which leads me to my next point... Cullen Bunn and John Barber's story doesn't work on its own terms, either. It's a jumble of characters no one gives you a reason to care about. Like, M.A.S.K. supposedly has a moral dilemma when they realize Transformers are sapient, but their characterization is so flimsy, and the reasons so nonexistent, that you can't get interested in this dilemma. But if you don't care about that, all you've got left is people in super-cars... which is not interesting, and doesn't play to the strengths of the comics medium. Exactly who was doing what when with a magic space rock was another thing I could never really discern. Say what you will about the Anti-Monitor (and I have), but he provides Crisis with a focal point. Revolution is murky. What's at stake? I dunno.

Fico Ossio is an above-average artist when it comes to drawing figures for IDW, but I found his panel-to-panel storytelling unclear at times.

I shudder to think how this is going to negatively impact the IDW Transformers line, which has already (outside of More than Meets the Eye) been moving in a direction I don't care for. It has definitely solidified my plan to not pick up Optimus Prime. When the regular series resume, it'll be Lost Light and Till All Are One for me, and that's it.

Transformers by IDW: « Previous in sequence | Next in sequence »… (meer)

I have so many misgivings...
7:01 pm 10 October 2016
Revolution #1 (of 5) - Cullen Bunn, John Barber, Fico Ossio, Tradd Moore
It was nice to see Optimus and it was even nicer to see Windblade on Earth. But I have so many more misgivings about the Revolution event after reading the first issue. I was hoping it would be okay because Barber is a writer for Transformers - my second favorite series, Robots in Disguise - and Bunn who I also like. (Mostly from his Deadpool work although his work on Wolverine was decent as well.) Instead, this is a clusterfuck. The idea is noteworthy: it brings together all the IDW properties like Rom and Transformers and GI Joe and makes the continuity compatible so they can more easily - I assume - incorporate crossovers. I am against this in the first place: the Transformers continuity is perfection as is, and it doesn't need crossovers. It works. Then take the task of folding all these universes together, split it up between two writers and the Transformers writer is a close second best to James Roberts.

Eh, I told myself. I told myself this before and after I read this. First of all, this seems way too split up: you have a good four or five continuities, all which need touching upon, and then you need to make all the histories match up. Not an easy task. I'd trust James Roberts to do this single-handedly, but he's not on board, not for the main event. (He is writing at least one tie-in issue.)

Overall, this was incredibly disappointing. Luckily, I got this in a Humble Bundle for backups of more of MTMtE and RiD and those cards. I also figured I'd Read some Revolution, see if I dug it, and get into more of the Transformers/GI Joe crossover, which I wasn't that into when I started. (It's a huge hit and since I'm getting it and it's got TF, I'll give volumes two and three a try.)
Transformers Graphic Novel IDW favorite character read in 2016… (meer)

Nope, nope, nope!
3:18 pm 12 October 2016
Revolution #2 (of 5) - Fico Ossio, Tradd Moore, John Barber, Cullen Bunn
Ugh. The more I read of this, the more discouraged I get. No, no, no, no. Why can't the TF universe be separate it was perfect that way why are you going to mess up things with this stupidity and all so you can have more stupid crossovers!!!!!

And look, it's not like I hate all crossovers. I just hate the way comics do them: it tends to spread out into all the series, like it has with this, and then you're fucked if you don't buy some random comic that you don't care about because otherwise you don't know where you are. I'm stupid and stubborn enough to continue buying titles I care about and no more, and this has served me poorly in the past. And sometimes well: Rocket and Groot is a fabulous Civil War II side story, for example.

That being said, I can see where this is going IDW and I don't like it. I don't like it one bit. I'm done with you after I review your 100 page special. Thank Primus it was just reprints because, y'know, I can deal with that bullshit!


Transformers Graphic Novel IDW Humble Bundle favorite character read in 2016… (meer)