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Heidi MacDonald, over at comics news website The Beat, sat down for a chat with co-founder and CEO of IDW Publishing Ted Adams. While they don't touch upon Transformers as much, they do mention it, one of their bigger licensed franchises - and there may be more to come in the second part of the interview tomorrow! Check out the robotic mentions below, and read the whole thing here.
THE BEAT: Since we’re doing a 15-anniversary look back, I wanted to ask you if you if you could lay out kind of the structure of IDW. I know that you started it with some partners and then IDT came in as investor — can you just talk about who’s still involved and
what their roles are?
ADAMS: Yeah absolutely. I started IDW with three other guys in 1999 and when we organized the business we each owned essentially 25% of the business. So there were four of us who owned 25% and that continued on for quite some time. In the early days of the business actually we weren’t a comic book publisher, we were just a creative service company that was doing art and design for a variety of entertainment companies. And so for the first probably 3 or 4 years of IDW it was just the four of us and a handful of employees. We really started with an art book by Ash Wood and that led us to doing 30 Days of Night and CSI comic books. That was around 2001-02 was when we were first starting to publish comic books. But it wasn’t really until probably 2004, 2005 when our publishing business started taking off, around the time we picked up the Transformers license, and really started to expand our publishing business. (Editor-in-chief) Chris Ryall came in and really helped us build that business.
[...]
If you look at the licensed books that we did when we first got into the game versus the licensed books that we do today, they just weren’t as good. And there’s that stigma that’s associated with a licensed book that I’ve never really understood. I think it’s starting to go away. Our Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles book is regularly on weekly Best Of lists. It was on a bunch of end of the year Best Of lists. The Godzilla book that we did with James Stokoe was critically acclaimed; the Transformers book that James Roberts writes for us is well received not just by people who like Transformers, but people who like well written comic books.
[...]
We also have comic books in the Transformers toys and it’s the same thing there. If you like that comic book, you got the Transformers toy as a gift for Christmas, you didn’t expect to get the comic book, it’s just a freebie in there. You read it, you liked it, the back of that comic book completely drives you to the direct market. If we’ve done our job right it very clearly explains to you, should you like this comic book, here’s the next thing to buy and here’s the place to buy it.
Continuing in our quest to bother all the creators over at IDW Publishing, and with a severe lack of Transformers comics coming out this week, we reached out for one of the biggest names right now, with his very unique style gracing the pages of several comics, from Autocracy and Monstrosity to Dark Cybertron via Chaos - ladies and gentlebots, please welcome Livio Ramondelli!
Va'al - Livio, thank you very much for agreeing to do this. As I've been doing with all out interviews so far, let's start from the very beginning: How did you first discover The Transformers? What's your first memory?
Livio - It's great to speak to you!
I first became aware of the Transformers with the original G1 cartoon. I have pretty sporadic but vivid memories of moments from it here and there. But it always stayed with me. The characters had a huge impact on me. I don't recall the first moment I saw Optimus Prime or Soundwave for example, I just remember them as being a big part of my childhood. When I was a little older, my family would regularly rent the animated movie over and over. Which is an insane concept that the next generation won't understand- you had to RENT a movie from a physical store? And they had a limited number of copies that someone could beat you to at any moment?
But regardless, we rented that movie so often we eventually bought it when I was around 13. Then I really began actively re-watching it and the series as a whole. I'd tape the reruns that aired, trying to assemble a collection of the entire series. It's definitely one of the things, along with Star Wars, that has been with me my entire life.
Va'al - I remember renting VHS and DVD. I also remember Blockbuster going bankrupt, which felt pretty bad actually.. But back to you and everyone's favourite transforming robots! You got into them as a visual thing, were you ever a toy person? Do you have any personal favourites?
Livio - I was definitely into the toys as well. To this day I remember which ones I had, and which ones I never got to own. Prime and Soundwave were always my favorite toys, which might factor into why they're my two favorite characters. I thought they were both very clever in how much they did as toys. I'm a huge fan of the current Masterpiece toy line as well. I bought the new Soundwave at BotCon last year, and it sits proudly in my art studio. I just love how they're taking the toys you remember and tweaking them to be even more like the characters, it's a genius move.
I'm still plagued by a few toys that I was never able to own as a kid. I never got a Sharkticon, for example. I always looked enviously at my friends who did.
Va'al - So would you say you had or still have any particular goals, in terms of toys? Would a Sharkticon be what we call a holy grail of plastic transforming robots to you? Or is there something else you'd really really like in your collection?
Livio - Of the original era of the toys.. a Sharkticon and Trypticon would probably be my two holy grails. I had Metroplex, but I never had Trypticon. Sometimes when I see some of them out-of-box at a comic convention I look longingly at them for a few moments. It's like looking at missing pieces from my childhood!
And like everyone, I'm anxious to see where the new Masterpiece series goes and which new figures will be released. I'd love to see a new Galvatron toy closer to the original series. But having Masterpiece Soundwave and the tapes feels so good. The design on Laserbeak and Buzzsaw ( where even the silver armored sections fold in on themselves to create a flat surface) is just mind-blowingly good.
Va'al - Those are some nifty little birds indeed, I agree. And I've only seen them in hand! We've touched upon you getting into the toys and the franchise as a whole, but how did you make it from there to comics? Were you a fan as you grew up?
Livio - Yeah, definitely. I loved the original Marvel run. By the time I got to them, a lot of them were already in back issue bins and so I was tracking them down to piece a collection together, the same way I was doing with Amazing Spider-Man and X-Men and other titles that I loved.
I stopped reading the comics when they sort of dried up in America, but then when Dreamwave got the license I certainly bought those. I thought the art and coloring was beautiful in those early issues. And then after that there were stories I read here and there, like the Jae Lee drawn G.I. Joe vs Transformers. Before the license came to IDW!
Va'al - And that's why should have been a fan growing up across the pond - to quote a certain writer, the series.. never ended. You were clearly a comics reader growing up, but what drew you into drawing yourself? Can you remember the early days of shifting doodling to actual drawing? Was it always a potential career option?
Livio - I know, I'm jealous of you guys across the pond! I also definitely noticed that a lot of UK readers have more of an affinity for the later G1 characters like Hot Rod and Ultra Magnus. Possibly because they did so much more in the UK run that we didn't get to see for a long time.
And I think most people who read comics try to draw them, really. I think if you're drawn to a creative medium like that you're almost certainly hoping you can one day draw or write them yourself. I don't remember an exact moment when it switched into a possible career, it was basically always a dream that I had and hoped I could do it one day. It still feels very surreal getting to draw these guys, and especially to work with someone like Flint Dille, who was such an architect of the G1 stuff I grew up on.
Va'al - Ultra Magnus does seem to be one of the latest big favourites, even with the whole 'controversial' take on him by Roberts and Milne, indeed. How would you describe your first venture into comics in general, before hitting the Transformers franchise at IDW? What's the story there?
Livio - My first venture into comics was one of two very random and lucky moments in my life. After I finished my time in Art school, I was hunting for a job. I was looking into concept art positions for the gaming and movie world. I thought that'd be a steady way to make a living and also be a lot of fun. Comics was sort of always my dream, but I didn't know how realistic it was. One of the blogs I'd check, for fun, was Gelatometti - Jim Lee and Wildstorm's art blog.
They suddenly had a job posting on it, looking for someone to join their team designing the DC Universe Online game. I applied and got hired through the blog, which was my first real gig. It was amazing, since Jim Lee was a huge hero of mine.. and continues to be. I worked there for about 5 years, learning a lot and contributing to a pretty massive game project. It also started me on the path of doing comic conventions across the country.. which lead to IDW.
Va´al - Aha! Here we are, the juicy stuff. What was your first IDW gig? Did they come for you, or did you pitch something to them?
Livio - It was very random! I was sitting at an Artist Alley table at Wondercon I believe. Just selling some prints and essentially fan artwork. IDW's head editor Chris Ryall walked by and happened to see my work, and gave me his card. He told me to submit samples. About a week later, I got an E-Mail from Andy Schmidt, who offered me the covers to The Best of Optimus Prime and Best of Megatron trade paperbacks. It was really a dream come true, and I'm very grateful for the chance.
I always suggest to anyone looking to work in comics to start showing your work at Artist Alley tables. Doesn't matter if you've been published! You never know who will walk by.
Va'al - That's some good advice, right there! So after cover art, Chaos, Autocracy, Monstrosity, Robots in Disguise and Dark Cybertron, where is the IDW partnership taking you next? Can you talk about anything at all with us, or is it still all under wraps?
Livio - I can say there's definitely two big projects coming that I'm excited about. Unfortunately I can't reveal details about them yet, which I understand makes for a very frustrating answer!
But as a teaser, and as most people are guessing, I'd say it's very likely that Chris, Flint and I will finish off our trilogy with another series. We should have a lot more information about that soon.
But I'd just like to take a second and thank all the readers for the response we've gotten doing Transformers comics for the last few years. We all really appreciate the support, and we work hard to hopefully give you guys a great ride with the stories we're telling.
Va'al - And we all really appreciate all of your work as creators! They may not be 'real' comics according to some publishers, but we know there are some really good stories being told. Livio, before we part ways, are there any other last words you'd like to share with our readers?
Livio - It's been a real pleasure chatting with you! And again, I'd just like to thank everyone out there for supporting the books. If you'd like to check out more of my work you can find me on deviantArt, Twitter and Instagram all with the insanely original handle of LivioRamondelli.
You heard the man, go follow him on various social media platforms - and read some more into Livio's creative process here! I extend my thanks to all the readers who have been following us this far, and end by saying there is more to come in our quest to bring you even more insight into the minds and hands of Transformers franchise creators. So keep your optics tuned to Seibertron.com!
We saw an interview just last week with Tom Scioli and John Barber, creators of the upcoming IDW Publishing Transformers vs G.I. Joe comic, but Comics Alliance have also just posted their own interview with the two writer/artists! Check out snippets below, including a preview of some of the artwork, and read the whole thing here.
Transformers vs. G.I. Joe is a crossover that sells it self, but the downside of that is that it’s been done often enough that it can be difficult to get excited about the next version. Unless, of course, you tell me that it’s going to be co-written, drawn, and lettered by Tom Scioli, the man who wrote the line “Robot Dracula is an efficient torturer” and rendered all other comics obsolete. If you do that, you have my attention, and that’s exactly what they did when they announced that Scioli and John Barber were kicking off an ongoing series about the two teams, set to launch with #0 on Free Comic Book Day.
To find out more about how the project came together, I spoke to Scioli and Barber about how the project came together, Scioli’s massive pitch document, and how their life-long and relatively recent love of the comics influenced their storytelling. Believe it or not, I don’t think we talk about Destro at all.
ComicsAlliance: We’ve seen Transformers vs. G.I. Joe stories before, going all the way back to Marvel.
Tom Scioli: Right, once or twice.
CA: What made you each want to tackle the project in a new form, aside from just the idea that people love the Transformers and love G.I. Joe?
John Barber: At IDW, I think we wanted to do this for a long time, institutionally, just for that very reason — but we’d always sort of resisted it. Without anything interesting to do with it, there was no reason to do it. We have some G.I. Joe comics, we have the Transformers comics, I think they’re both pretty good… but if you’re going to combine them, you have to do something really different and really special. Knowing this year was going to be the 30th anniversary of Transformers and the 50th anniversary of the original G.I. Joe, we really wanted to do something with the two. We weren’t going to waste the opportunity, but if there wasn’t anything good to do, we didn’t want to do it. And then, enter Tom. [Laughs]
Tom Scioli: For me, I’m such a backseat driver with every movie I see. You almost can’t help it, once you get involved with writing, drawing or whatever. You start viewing the whole world that way. From day one of the Transformers movies, for me, it was like “okay, if I was doing the Transformers story, I’d do this, I’d do that,” and when John suggested doing a Transformers vs. G.I. Joe story, that was perfect. That’s exactly what Transformers kind of needs. The Transformers themselves were cool, but the humans never held up their end of the bargain, so having G.I. Joe be the humans, that’s perfect. They’re iconic, comics-y, sci-fi characters in their own right, so you finally have that missing ingredient.
[...]
CA: So how did you guys get together? Did you have to convince Tom that he should be drawing Transformers vs. G.I. Joe?
TS: It took no convincing at all. In fact, if I recall, John was vaguely apologetic about it, like “I don’t know if you’d like to do this or not, but…” and to me, of course, that sounds awesome. That’s right up my alley. Giant robots and quasi-superhero sci-fi army men. That’s perfect.
JB: The whole dirty secret of this is that Tom had emailed into IDW, and I was a big fan of his from Myth of 8-Opus and Godland. I was sitting there, and I don’t know how this train of thought got to me, but I was reading East of West, and looking at Nick Dragotta’s art, and thinking about how when he and Jonathan Hickman had done Fantastic Four, he was doing a little more of a Kirby thing. I’d emailed Tom that day about something else, and I thought, “you know what would be absolutely bananas? Doing this comic with Tom.”
TS: John had this elevator pitch of what he wanted this comic to be, and it sounded great. It was the sort of thing I could run with, and the ideas just kept coming. At that point, it was just sort of a “maybe.” Even though it wasn’t a thing yet, even though it was just a notion, I started thinking about things we could do. I’ve had that happen a couple of times, and I’d gotten to a point where I’d fight that impulse, but in recent years, I just let my imagination go where it’s going to go. I can do something with it. Even at that point, I was thinking “okay, if this ends up not happening, I can use some of this energy and some of these ideas somewhere else.” I’ve been working on a creator-owned sci-fi thing in the background, so if worse comes to worse, I can repurpose some of these ideas.
So I just kept going, and basically from the day John said it was something we could do, I’ve been working on it. So when it was finally something we were going to do, I had this huge thick stack of story that I dropped on John.
JB: You came in gangbusters, and it was all cool stuff. The floodgates opened, and I think it really helped that you were coming in as a fresh set of eyes.
TS: I think you’re right. To have this enthusiasm for the material. You’re a longtime fan and you’ve been working on it, and you still have an enthusiasm, but it’s probably not as white-hot as it was when you were a kid first discovering it. It’s nice to have a balance of someone who has the experience and knowledge of this stuff, and then someone whose head is currently exploding with how great it is.
Following in the string of interviews with comics creators we've been seeing recently, comics and entertainment news website Bleeding Cool were able to have a chat with Simon Furman, writer of part of the original Marvel G1 comics and currently ready to end that story with ReGeneration One #100. Read some extracts below, and the whole interview here!
Simon Furman is, to quote the man himself, “like unto a living god,” at least for Transformers fans. He started out writing for Marvel UK in the 80′s, and saw the Transformers comic through a legendary period, penning the most memorable TF comics in the franchise’s history.
Recently IDW gave Furman a chance to pick up his twenty-year-old story lines in an epic what-if series called ReGeneration One (think X-Men Forever, with giant robots). The series picked up in 2012 at issue #81, following the final issue, #80 released in 1991, and will conclude with issue #100 in March.
[...]
SE: How do you feel about ending it after all this time?
SF: Mixed emotions. Both Andrew (Wildman) and I were only interested in doing this if it was to bring it to conclusion. So it feels like job done. Finally. But it’s quite sad too, because you get invested in it and the characters all over again. You start seeing new angles and new story possibilities and you have to resist, because everything is supposed to be building to a wrap-up. You can’t risk opening any new doors. But mostly I feel satisfied that we’ve done the book proud and can be proud ourselves of what (even as purely Regeneration One) has become a substantial body of work. We originally envisioned a 5 or 6-issue limited series. So to get 20, plus an 80.5, an issue #0 and a giant-sized final issue is just incredible. We really can’t complain.
SE: Tell us a little of what we can expect in issue #100.
SF: A lot of connectivity. Issue #100 will – l hope – feel like the capstone to a 100-issue series, rather than just Regeneration One. The thing that’s been building, that comes to a head this issue, has its roots in the original series as much Regeneration One. So I hope readers feel the full impact of the ‘bigger picture’, the thing that’s been tick-ticking away in the background like a timebomb and now explodes. Certainly, as we join the story, the situation is already beyond dire. As one character puts it, “maybe we already lost this one.” And honestly, maybe they have. But there’s a still bigger picture that needs saving, even if it means a truly terrifying scale of sacrifice. Certainly there’s no halfhearted cop-outs here, no magical quick fixes. But there’s still a heck of a lot to strive for and some massive obstacles to overcome before they get there. It’s backs to the wall time, against an enemy that in many ways is homegrown, a part of themselves.
[...]
SE: You’ve also been involved in numerous other iterations of the Transformers, particularly the “ultimate TFs” IDW continuity. How have you liked the work James Roberts and John Barber are doing these days?
SF: James and John are doing great work. I feel, finally, that the IDW-verse is in safe hands.
We have already heard about new fan-built Transformers character Windblade, but comics news website ComicBookResources was also able to have a chat with writer Mairghread Scott about what's to come in the four-issue mini-series set on Cybertron! Read excerpts below, and the whole thing here.
In the wake of the "Dark Cybertron" crossover, the various Transformers are in disarray. And things are about to get even more interesting for the characters, as writer Mairghread Scott and artist Sarah Stone -- the first all-female creative team to ever work on a Transformers series -- will soon be hitting them with the imminent arrival of Windblade.
The first "fan-built bot" created through a number of polls on Hasbro's website, Windblade's design, features and abilities were all decided by the general public and brought to life by Hasbro designer Lenny Panzica. The sword-wielding, jet-powered female Transformer looks set to cause a whole load of trouble for the rest of Cyberton's sons and daughters in her own four-issue, self-titled miniseries due to kick off in April. Scott spoke to CBR about her plans for the character -- and just what her arrival means for IDW Publishing's Transformers Universe as a whole.
CBR News: Windblade arrived in the IDW Transformers continuity during the recent "Dark Cybertron" crossover event. Following that story, what kind of state are the Autobots and Decepticons in as this miniseries kicks off? How are they recovering -- or not -- from the event?
Mairghread Scott: I don't think it spoils anything to say that things get a little, well -- dark by the end of "Dark Cybertron" and the whole event has very much demoralized the entire planet. Fighting an endless war is tiring, but there are only so many times you can rebuild your home-world before you start to feel like things just aren't gonna get any better.
But, in a way, this is also the perfect time to introduce a new character like Windblade because she's seeing so many things for the first time. There's an old saying that "evil triumphs when good men do nothing," and "Transformers Windblade" is just as much about the danger of staying on the sidelines as it is about evil itself.
[...]
She was created after winning a fan-poll from Hasbro which asked fan to help create a new character. How exciting was it to have the chance to introduce and establish a character into continuity?
It was extremely exciting. The moment they announced Windblade, I told John Barber that I was calling dibs on her if she made it to the comics. It's nice to see that still works. But, in all seriousness, it really is amazing to feel like Sarah and I are getting to make a little bit of Transformers history. We get to bring in a whole new character (and hopefully a new readership) to our favorite brand; we're pulling out all the stops to make sure Windblade earns a spot in Transformers for a long time to come.
[...]
There are other female Transformers, but the majority of them are identified as male. Are you interested in writing and exploring that in this series? Do the other characters treat her differently for being a female, or do they not even notice?
Obviously, Starscream's gonna use any kind of wedge issue he can -- because he's Starscream.
But Cybertronians in general are less interested in that kind of thing, and that's something I really love about the brand. Think about it: If you're fighting another Transformer, it's a lot more crucial to know what they turn into (tank, jet, flash drive) than what pronoun they use. Characters who don't know Windblade are obviously curious about who she is, but who she is, is so much more than "female."
The official website for Free Comic Book Day, the book crossing event taking place on the first Saturday of May every year, has just uploaded a series of interviews with the creators of their free comic books 2014 - which includes IDW Publishing's Transformers vs G.I. Joe! Read part of the interview with writer and artist Tom Scioli and co-writer John Barber, and check out the whole piece here.
FCBD: For those who might be new to your comic book, give a quick rundown. What can we expect to see in terms of story and art?
Tom Scioli (writer/artist/colorist/letterer): "It’s the first chapter of TRANSFORMERS VS. G.I. JOE. It tells the story of the first encounter between the G.I. JOE team and the TRANSFORMERS of CYBERTRON. It’s got the scale and action of a summer superhero blockbuster, but with the unlimited budget that only the comics medium can provide. There’s a space battle. There’s an assault on an underground COBRA base built on the ruins of the ancient city of Koh-Buru-Lah. There are cool science fiction ideas, like the Doomsday Seed. The story culminates in a massive aerial battle between planes, helicopters, jet packs, and giant killer machines from space. We also establish the relationships between the characters in a compelling, sometimes funny, sometimes poignant, sometimes tragic manner. There are character origins, deaths and lasting consequences. It’s a story that readers will never forget."
John Barber (co-writer/hanger-on): "Yeah, Tom hit it right on the head. This is such a unique and different take on the characters—really honoring the past but pushing the comics aspect out there further than ever… there’s stuff you can literally only do in comics, and Tom’s pulled off a lot of storytelling bits that I’ve never seen before. But the story is really non-stop, relentless action. Funny, touching, thrilling… usually in the same panel."
FCBD: What has been your favorite part of book or character to tackle?
Tom: "I really enjoyed the research process. Having grown up in the eighties, I had a certain level of familiarity with the characters, but in preparation for this series I dived headfirst into it. I read piles of comics, watched hours of cartoons and movies. It was intoxicating. The character of SNAKE EYES is the breakout character of G.I. JOE, so I had a lot of fun writing for him. He’s fun to draw, too. In a way he’s the original template for the ’90s Image-style characters—all pouches, straps, guns, grenades, mystery and attitude. I like STARSCREAM, too. It took a lot of practice to figure out his visual representation. He’s the one from the original cartoon that had the most interesting story. He’s the second banana, living and plotting in MEGATRON’s shadow. How did this envious, jealous, scheming social climber get to be the right hand man to somebody he hates? The one character that really made an impression on me above all in the old G.I. JOE comics is DR. VENOM. He’s kind of an obscure character. He’s profoundly evil, genuinely frightening, but darkly funny. He’s the representation of the banality of evil. He’s very ordinary looking in the operatically-costumed world of G.I. JOE. He is a lot of fun to write."
John: "For me, already get to play in the G.I. JOE and TRANSFORMERS sandboxes every day, editing G.I. JOE and a couple TRANSFORMERS comics and writing TRANSFORMERS: ROBOTS IN DISGUISE. What’s been fun for me is coming at the characters from a totally different perspective… really coming at them from a unique point of view. I love this idea of approaching them in a grand, operatic tradition—the sense of scale is huge, and I the whole sense of story and of the construction of this world is so amazing and so wild, it’s a lot of fun to be a part of."
[...]
FCBD: Looking to the future of the book, is there anything you can tease about what's upcoming?
Tom: "We’re building toward a massive confrontation between the people of Earth and the people of CYBERTRON, a planet full of living, thinking, feeling, killer war-’bots."
John: "I can promise you this story doesn’t go the direction you think it’s going to go. There have been clashes between the TRANSFORMERS and G.I. JOE in comics before, but there has never been anything like TRANSFORMERS VS. G.I. JOE."
Courtesy of the Snakas blog from Autobase Aichi, we are able to get a glimpse of a feature from issue 193 of Figure King, in which Takara Designer Shogo Hasui reveals some elements of the upcoming Transformers Masterpiece Wheeljack figure. Read on below for an attempted translation of the original, found here.
(The article also lists other highlights from the magazine, including a special Tomy licensed Transformers iPhone 5 case).
* The interpretation of Wheeljack's transformation was rather 'arcane' (new? innovative?).
* "Structure of the head and waist became great way stuffing"
* The removable shoulder cannon can be installed in the vehicle mode roof.
* The hand gun can be stored in the figure's 'underbody' (?).
* The wings on the robot's back are transformable, and do not need to be removed.
* Thansk to the Tomica branch of the company (model cars), the licensing was a lot easier to negotiate with car manufacturers.
* Color of the car mode is faithful to the actual vehicle. On the other hand, the robot mode colors are closer to the cartoon.
* Thanks to the sale numbers for MP- Lambor to Streak, they were able to add new parts to Smokescreen, and Wheeljack was developed without having to consider repurposing.
* The first three realistic cars of the Masterpiece line were supposed to become 'super cars'.
Comics and entertainment news site Bleeding Cool was able to sit down (virtually) and have a chat with the current fan-favourite IDW Transformers writer James Roberts. They touched upon the author's arrival into the franchise as a fan, as well as his development in comics - and you can read about it here, or some snippets below!
RC: I understand you were a fan long before your own name began appearing in the credit boxes, but was it Transformers specifically that really prompted your efforts to write, or had you gone the traditional route with university and the like?
JR: I was a fan when G1 was out, yes. Bit of a latecomer, though: I was ten in 1986 when I started collecting the toys and buying the UK comic. I wrote stories before I became a TF fan, although inevitably my love for the characters and concepts informed a lot of what I wrote in my formative years. I even edited a fanzine, Transtext, in my mid-teens, wherein I published both my own material and stories submitted by other fans.
I think what my love of Transformers did was encourage me to write science-fiction to the exclusion of all else, which wasn’t necessarily a good thing. I have since corrected that, but most of the fiction I wrote during my teenage years had a science-fiction bent.
[...]
RC: In the first issue of MTMTE Prowl received a message from the future listing all the things the crew of the Lost Light should avoid: don’t open the coffin, don’t let them take Skids, don’t go to Delphi and don’t look in the basement. These stories have all for the most part played out since. How far in advance are you coyly planning your work? And will we get a similar tease for stories yet to come?
JR: MTMTE #1 is mostly setup, as you’d expect. It’s designed as a grand pre-credits sequence in the tradition of Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia, with the camera sweeping in and shadowing a character or two and then veering off to focus on someone else. By the issue’s end the crew of the Lost Light has been assembled, the ship has taken off, there’s been an accident, and our heroes have been thrown into deep space. With the message from the future at the very end of issue 1, I wanted to show that what you’ve just read is merely the beginning of a huge, sprawling, multiyear quest stuffed full of action, adventure and intrigue – I wanted readers to feel confident that we knew where we was going, that everything was mapped out, and that it was worth them investing their time in this series.
[...]
RC: James, it has been a blast talking with you. One last thing though, will we ever find out what is in Brainstorm’s briefcase? Might it be the soul of Marsellus Wallace?
JR: It’s a straight question, it deserves a straight answer. And the answer is “yes”.
I like mysteries, I like slow builds, I like inviting speculation… but I also like answers, concrete and logical and sometimes even face-palm-y. So yes, the mystery of Brainstorm’s briefcase will be revealed. It will be opened, and there will be consequences… big, frightening, quest-defining consequences.
Thanks once again to Comic Book Resources, we get a taste of what's to come in the IDW comics world, and this time, it's time for ReGeneration One. Read the whole interview with writer Simon Furman here, with some snippets reported below!
This March, writer Simon Furman closes out his legendary "Transformers" run for a second time with "Transformers: Regeneration One" #100 from IDW Publishing featuring art by Guido Guidi. "Regeneration One," based on the classic Hasbro toys, is the continuation of Marvel Comics' original "Transformers" series which Furman concluded for the first time with issue #80 -- all the way back in 1991. IDW resurrected that series and its continuity with "Regeneration One" #81 in 2012, recruiting Furman to properly close out his "Transformers" saga with a final 20-issue maxi-series.
Furman recently discussed ending his legendary run with CBR News, revealing how #100 caps off the run that began in the '80s, why he turned Rodimus Prime into the "guts n' grit" Prime he always wanted, which infamous inside joke is making it to the final cover and much more.
[...]
So what exactly is going down in "Regeneration One" #100?
Perhaps not what people are thinking. We've been building to this big confrontation with Jhiaxus (a former Cybertronian senator from before the Great War who stole a bunch of secrets and deleted himself from Cybertronian history), but that is not the end. There's this other 'big bad' that's been staring us in the face and is a lot closer to home (in Cybertronian terms). It's one of those classic, 'even if they win... they lose' scenarios, as what they're fighting is essentially one of their own (in the most fundamental way possible) and the stakes are so much higher, the picture so much bigger than anyone (characters or readers) could have imagined.
Can we expect any familiar faces to reappear during the finale?
One or two, yeah, but largely we're not pulling any 'out of left field' stuff in terms of the characters featured. But there's a few surprises and one or two (haven't seen 'em for a while) cameos. Andrew [Wildman]'s cover to #100 kind of blows one of our big 'this series is a 100-issues old' twists, but there's yet more twists and turns.
[...]
Could we see spinoffs or miniseries set in this continuity down the line or are you putting a definitive end to all of it?
It's a definitive end. Sort of. Y'know, it's splitting hairs but how definitive does it have to be to be classed as definitive? This is "Transformers." Which never ends. But it is an end. Until anyone with the power to make it happen says different.
Seibertron.com staffer and talented voice over professional, jON3.0 conducted an interview with fellow voice actor Richard Sellers. Mr. Sellers made an appearance on our news page just the other day, which you can read about here: /transformers/ ... toy/29404/
In the included embed below, Jon discusses his various work with Hasbro and in doing so we find out that Mr. Sellers is the voice of Optimus Prime in the Rescue Bots toyline, Transformers greeting cards and ornaments, plus he's recording material for the Age Of Extinction toy line. Grimlock, as we found out in his previous news bit, is one of his toy projects, with 7 others he can't name at this time.
Also of note, Mr. Sellers had the chance to work with Peter Cullen and found out that Mr. Cullen will be doing all the voice work for the AoE line.
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