[showka]

Is anyone reading this? Escalation and the previous six issue arc Infiltration have been my favorite Transformer related things since the movie. The stories aren't serious or realisitic so much as they're believable instead of insultingly dumb. Kind of like the Batman Animated Series, they explain a lot of stuff so that it at least is convincing within its own world.

[showka]

I actually like the humans, because (as I think Simon Furman said) the Transformers all to often blows its wad early and we get panel after panel of giant robots fighting over a city. For a long time I never understood why the Transformers was set on Earth besides the fact that the robots needed their Earth vehicle alternate forms. Infiltration not only makes the Earth setting believable, it uses the setting to make the entire story more interesting. In doing this, it has to use human characters. In Infiltration especially, they drive the story.

I think the big problem is how cliched the human were. I don't mind the alien conspiracy guy, just because he's an adult and even though he has the most wacky premise, he never really acts like a tool. The girl isn't that bad most of the time but her premise is too corny. Thankfully its only dealt with occassionally, and maybe watching so many episodes of Batman recently have made me realize that characters like this don't have to ruin a comic book for me.

The only human I flat out don't like is that mechanic guy. He's super poorly realized and is drawn like an ugly muppet. Seriously, I wonder if Simon Furman even told the artist the mechanic kid was going to be a major character because he's drawn worse than any other human being in the series.

Speaking of drawing, I personally love the artwork. It didn't look that great at first, but either the artist is getting better or I've grown on it because it looks fucking wonderful now. There's a sense of realism, or maybe restraint in the drawings that just hasn't been present in anything related to the Transformers ever (the new comics are more bombastic than even the original cartoon show). In fact, thats probably what I like most about this comic in general, its all reasonable. Cool shit happens when cool shit is suppossed to happen, and it doesn't try too hard all the time.

I think even people who thought Infiltration was too slow will like Escalation. The pace is the same as Infiltration but more stuff is happening now. Also, the more gets revealed about how the plot and how the Transformers operate the better everything is.

A few times I got to the comic book store only to find the new Escalation wasn't there, and in my desperate whoredom I bought both the Beast Wars and Evolutions TPB. I have to say I'm dissapointed with them.

Beast Wars wasn't bad, its just not that interesting (sort of a side-story to the original Beast Wars cartoon, which I was never really watched). The art is fucking great though. The Predicon leader Magmatron looks awesome - he transforms into three seperate dinosaurs, and is drawn wonderfully.

Evolutions has a great concept and a wonderful first three pages (interesting design on the pre-awakened Transformers) but a story that moves slowly before reaching an abrupt, bullshit ending. The designs are neat. There's awesome pictures of Megatron and Prime in the concept art at the back of the book but - SPOILER ALERT - they aren't even in the story!

I didn't know that Stormbringer was a prequel to the Infiltration / Escalation series until it all the comics had come out, so now I'm waiting for the TPB to get released. I had no idea it would take as long as it has.

They're also running the Spotlight series as a kind of companion piece to Escalation, but most of the issues of that I've read seem like a huge cop-out. It takes the subtle, slow pacing of the main series and just rips it to shreds in order to show robots fighting on various random, cliched alien planets. To read them and still enjoy the "main" series requires constructing a mental wall within my mind that certain disturbing thoughts cannot pass. The Shockwave issue was fucking great though, and I like the way they draw Ultra Magnus.