BRAM STOKER’S DRACULA #4: THE CHANGiNG FACE OF EViL

23 March 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

While it’s not the easiest to read (and so wouldn’t have stood out from the cover on newsagent shelves), look closely at Mika Mignola’s cover to this latest edition of Dark Horse International’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula and you’ll spot a new addition to this fourth issue. Vampirella has joined the comic as a back up strip, just as Xenozoic Tales would join the fourth issue of the publisher’s Jurassic Park later in the year.

For both series, sales figures had proved themselves enough that the three-weekly movie adaptations were turned into monthly ongoings, the final chapter split in order to get ahead of the new schedule and introduce readers to new content. Inside this comic, both strips run to 14 pages, Dracula himself getting exactly half the amount as normal. However, Vampirella gets no introduction anywhere and the editorial is still in the hands of Van Helsing.

I’m going to assume once the main strip concludes we’ll no longer have these characterful introductions so I’m enjoying them while they last. The final chapter begins with a scene that simply can’t be conveyed properly through still images, that of Anthony Hopkins devouring his food in the English pub like a savage. The result is a much more restrained version of the character, which is unfortunate.

In fact, I realise this has been the main problem for writer Roy Thomas all this time. It’s just impossible to convey in a comic the wonderful acting choices the talented cast made throughout the movie. However, when we turn the page and Mina questions him on how her best friend Lucy died, we do get one of the film’s rare comedic moments still intact. Darkly comedic of course. Very darkly comedic.

This chapter includes the burning of the boxes containing Transylvanian soil Dracula had moved to his newly purchased, abandoned Abbey. It includes all of the ancient text, the Latin words spoken by Van Helsing to cleanse the place of evil. But more interestingly for me is the beginning of this scene with the rules of the vampire set out. They were a world apart from the clichéd rules we’d become used to from decades of other movies and TV shows.

Alongside the death of Renfield the main bulk here is dedicated to Mina deciding to join her beloved Count in eternal life. While it’d be impossible to convey how surprisingly touching this scene was (especially given what it was about!) thanks to the excellent performances of Gary Oldman and Winona Ryder, penciller Mike, inker John Nyberg and colourist Mark Chiarello (alongside letterer John Costanza) do an excellent job of portraying their intimacy in what’s actually a shocking moment. For an adaptation of this movie it’s perfect.

The iconic moment of Dracula using one of his nails to slice across his chest, drawing blood for Mina to drink, is presented in a similar fashion. Then the colours are shifted for one panel to highlight the key moment. After two pages of blue this really stands out. Then, interrupted by Jonathan and Van Helsing, Dracula changes into his man bat form and reiterates his anger from the beginning of the film. I always found this the most fascinating and surprising part of the character; a devoted Christian who had sacrificed so much in the name of their God, the religion’s archaic beliefs and the selfish nature of its men betraying him.

I never knew this side of the character from the Dracula films we saw growing up; he and Christianity are essentially two sides of the same coin. While the cross and Van Helsing’s devotion to the faith fight evil, Coppola’s film never let us forget whose fault this was in the first place, why Vlad became what he did. On the flip side, he’s obviously a monster and a mass murderer but we never forget why this happened to him. The film perfectly balances this to such a degree that we’re both horrified and emotionally moved by him.

In the middle of the issue is Bloodlines by Dave Hughes, the usual two-page news section about all things vampiric in the world of 90s entertainment. Dracula’s Oscar nominations are mentioned and, while I could easily look up who did and did not win, I’m going to wait and let the comic tell me, just as readers at the time had to. I’m looking forward to finding out, though.

The competition informs us of the insane lead time needed when working on the comic, the Sound Bites are actually interesting this month with their comparison between 1977 (the year I was born, funnily enough) and 1993 in respect to thoughts about vampire films, and there’s mention of all-night events at the cinema. Personally, I found watching Terminator 1, 2 and Genisys back-to-back in a cinema long enough, never mind a whole night! (Especially given how that place smelled by the end.)

I have to say the choice of image for the award nominations as presented by Columbia Pictures is a strange one. To anyone not familiar with the film they could easy assume Tom Waits was playing the lead character. Then opposite this always-fun news feature is the first page of our black-and-white back up and I breathed a sigh when I saw it. Not of relief, but of disappointment and pessimism.

Over the years I’ve seen Vampirella comics advertised here and there and even as an impressionable teenage boy I always felt her clothing (or lack of) was shamelessly gratuitous. Not that I would’ve used those words as a teenager! As an adult I think she always looked like she was there to appeal to a certain type of male reader, of which I am not. So while researching for this review it was a shock to find out she was co-created by a woman.

Trina Robbins did so much fantastic work to raise the profile of women in comics that I’m rethinking my assumptions about this character

Vampirella was created by Forrest J. Ackerman (literary agent, actor, editor) and Trina Robbins (Wonder Woman, Strip AIDS, GoGirl!) in 1969. Trina did so much fantastic work to raise the profile of women in comics throughout her life I’m rethinking my assumptions about this character. In fact, it was Trina who designed her look. Editor Archie Goodwin then continued to write and develop her.

While the issue gives no official introduction other than the cover headline, there’s a brief history of the character in the strip. So, Earth’s vampires originate from Dracula, a forgotten member of the Vampiri race who left his homeworld (Drakulon) centuries ago only to be corrupted by the demonic entity known as Chaos. Vampirella is the last of her race who came to our planet after her own died out. With no other choice, she has to feed on human blood. However, underneath she’s good so I’m assuming she attacks and drinks but does not kill. Even Dracula was originally peaceful in his story. I also assume the ridiculously revealing costume is how her race dress.

It’d be polite to say this story is “of its time”. While Trina co-created her, this particular story (of which she was not involved in) feels very much like a strip written by men for men. Rescued from the cold by a doctor running a remote retreat for the rich, he’s amputated her apparently rotting wings and is clearly lusting after her, despite an angry nurse claiming he must keep his distance from Vampirella while dangling a satanic-looking necklace.

The best part is a graveyard scene depicting a descendent of Van Helsing‘s digging up bodies to ram stakes through their hearts. This might explain why this story has been chosen as a back up and it’s an interesting segue, but in the main I’m disappointed with our main character. She’s scared of the doctor, terrified even, and for most of the strip is portrayed as having a strong will to resist whatever drugs she’s on. She’s piecing together the mystery of what’s going on but then suddenly she’s snogging the man after a simple slug of his blood.

The strip is from 1970 so it’s very much from a time when a strong female lead character was rare. In fact, that was still a rare thing when Barrie Tomlinson created Kitten Magee in Wildcat comic in the late 1980s! But this was the 70s, so apparently a strong female character still had to be dressed to appeal to men’s baser instincts and fall for the man full of red flags at the drop of a hat. This doesn’t read well today.

Back to the comic’s title character and the Inside Dracula making-of series by Gary Gerani and Dave Hughes is only one page this month, possibly to spread the final part over two issues just like the strip. A piece about Salem’s Lot by Seamus Ryan is the random substitute for one page, in which he discusses its vastly different cuts. Disappointingly, there’s still no sign of the promised Sadie Frost interview and by this point I’m just going to assume it’s not going to appear.

The mention of deleted scenes reminded me I still hadn’t checked them out so I got my Apple TV on and watched them today. I like making-of features but usually skip deleted scenes (they’ve been deleted for a reason). After watching them for Dracula I can still say the only exception are the ones from The Lost World: Jurassic Park, which I’d love to see added back in to that movie. Oh, and Dracula’s final box office? On a budget of $40,000,000 it raked in a superb $215,862,692 according to Box Office Mojo. Superb! And well deserved!

The final paragraph of director Francis Ford Coppola’s view on why he makes movies reminds me of why I write. So it feels like a fitting note to end the review on. I’m intrigued to find out what direction the comic is headed in and look forward to the art depicting the movie’s climax in just three weeks, on Sunday 13th April 2025.

iSSUE THREE < > iSSUE FiVE

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Comic Reviews, Dracula

BRAM STOKER’S DRACULA #3: iCONiC EYE CANDY

2 March 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

Mike Mignola’s cover may not be as intricately painted as last month’s but through clever used of colour, and the changing of the logo to suit, we’ve another atmospheric introduction to the latest issue of Dark Horse International’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula. This third edition went on sale this day 32 years ago and continues with its regular format for now, with a 28-page chapter of the movie adaptation and four pages of extras bringing up the rear.

I have to say I still love the comic’s editorial page every issue. Written in the style of the Van Helsing character from the film it’s an inventive and fun way to kickstart things every three weeks. It certainly makes the plain contents pages of DHI’s Jurassic Park comic feel like a wasted opportunity. Here, Anthony Hopkins’ voice reminds us who some of the other characters are who’ll be featuring heavily in this issue, an issue with a surprising amount of iconic imagery, which I’ll get to later.

After such a great start in the first two editions, as we get into the meat of the second half of the film it feels like the strip is having to play catch up. It’s racing along, jumping back and forth between scenes after only paying lip service to them. Even as a fan of the film who watches it every Hallowe’en it felt confusing, like it’s been hastily chopped up and squeezed in rather than being properly adapted to another medium.

Don’t get me wrong, thanks to an interview with the writer of The Lost World: Jurassic Park’s adaptation we know how difficult it can be to adapt a movie to comic form and this film in particular couldn’t have been easy! I get that. So please do not see any critiques as being critical of writer Roy Thomas, this must have been a next-to-impossible task, it’s an incredibly visual film and delivers a lot of its thrills through original direction.

There are moments where I’d defy anyone who hasn’t seen the film in a long time to instantly recognise what’s happening. I last saw it only a few of months ago and I still had to reread some pages and look longer at some panels to remember what was meant to be going on. The problem is it’s suddenly trying too hard to follow the film moment-for-moment, instead of adapting it like we know the team is more than capable of from the previous issues .

As the film used its quick cuts, speeded up moments and dramatic music we easily followed what was going on while at the same time feeling bombarded and breathless, as intended by Coppola. But trying to do that with still images just isn’t going to work. However, the quieter moments between Dracula and Mina are again the highlight of the issue and highly enjoyable.

Special mention again to letterer John Costanza for the various forms of diary entries. A pattern emerges as I continue to read. The human moments are handled particularly well but the horror elements fall flat and end up confusing. Thankfully, there are some dramatic moments that come from the more chatty human scenes instead of the visual flair of Coppola, and in these instances the comic’s potential shines.

I mentioned iconic imagery, but what do I mean by that? Simply that there were certain images in the film that perfectly captured its intent as a whole. There are also fan favourite moments, as well as scenes which perfectly summed up Francis Ford Coppola’s vision with just a quick snippet.

These are largely intact here and the first is that iconic moment when the Prince and Mina dance by candlelight, Winona’s character in that elegant and memorable red dress set against the darkness, perfectly capturing the colour palette of the film and thus encapsulating more than the moment itself. These were moments also used in the marketing at the time and ever since for good reason.

The ancient texts telling the story of Vlad, Sadie Frost’s Lucy character receiving her final bite to transform her and the giant man bat moment that the behind-the-scenes feature below actually talks about. All of these and more are present and correct, and all are brought to the page superbly by penciller Mike, inker John Nyberg and colourist Mark Chiarello.

The creepy, terrifying crypt scene involving the now undead Lucy takes up a good chunk of the end of this issue’s chapter and I love Mark’s decision to not use any shading whatsoever when drawing her. As a result she stands out from the page as an ethereal entity, the contrast of the blood feeling all the more gruesome.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still enjoying this but in a different way than it was intended. Instead of reading it like a normal comic and being drawn into its story it’s like a love letter from the artists to the film. I’ve spoken at length in the previous reviews about how the artists have been able to craft the same atmosphere through a brave, original stylistic choice and it continues here. But you might struggle if you’re hoping the comic can tell the story on its own.

Dracula was released in the UK right at the beginning of 1993 and 32 years later as I began this real time read through a certain other movie was released, coincidentally enough. This timing passed me by until I read these panels below, which are our final highlight of the issue’s strip.

To the extras now and as usual things kick off with Inside Coppola’s Dracula and this time Gary Gerani is focussing on the special effects of the film. Famously, director Francis eschewed the new CGI trend and very deliberately used old fashioned movie-making techniques to give it the feeling of something made around the time in which it was set. Imaginative and genius use of classic “smoke and mirrors” techniques were used and interestingly we get the origin of that phrase here too.

The comparisons to Lucifer are interesting in explaining the use of a literal bat man rather than the usual, clichéd tiny bat in basically all other vampire films up to that point. The explanation here makes so much more sense. The transformation into a wolf was new to me when I first saw it as a teenager, werewolves were a completely separate entity from Dracula as far as I was concerned, so it was a surprise to be proven wrong.

“Two newish magazines with more than a passing interest in the orthodontic removal of corpuscles via the jugular vein.”
Dave Hughes

But what about that hand prop? I’ve never seen any photo or video of it but I can’t help but think of the hand effects from the short-lived 80s TV series Manimal. There’s a blast from the past! I think the prop for this film would’ve looked quite a bit better though, to say the least. Moving on to the Bloodlines news pages and Dave Hughes certainly doesn’t hold back with some of his reviews this time around.

Interesting to read that some comics prices really weren’t that much different to today (despite complaints about today’s prices), Ellen Datlow’s anthology books certainly sound interesting and on the second page some quotes from Winona Ryder and Gary Oldman are missing the context given to them last issue and so unfortuanately come across as tabloid-like here. That’s a shame because otherwise this is the most enjoyable Bloodlines yet. Written in a more relaxed and chatty style it’s really rather fun, even if it is missing the promised interview with Sadie Frost that I was particularly looking forward to.

We’re obviously approaching the end of the movie’s storyline and after such a promising and atmospheric start I find myself more excited about what’s to come after the main strip ends rather than it’s climax. The comic still offers up that art though and the extras are fun, then there’s that mysterious future for the remainder of the issues to find out about. That’s enough for me to eagerly anticipate #4 on Sunday 23rd March 2025.

iSSUE TWO < > iSSUE FOUR

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Competitions

OiNK BLOG DOUBLES COMPETiTiON: MARCH 2025

1 March 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

Thanks to everyone who entered last month’s inaugural OiNK Blog Doubles Competition! Most (but not all of you!) got the answer right, there were 375 posts on the blog’s Instagram covering the real time read through of Marvel UK’s epic Transformers comic. The answer was in its introductory post in the Transformers section of the blog. The winner plucked from the trough was Ian Snow from Berkshire who won a copy of the special gatefold edition of Transformers: Generation 2 and a few other issues from the run. Congrats Ian!

So what’s next?

For March, how’d you like to get your hands on a couple of hilarious tales of The Sleeze Brothers? In order to complete my own collection I ended up with two issues as doubles from its limited six-issue run. Now one OiNK Blog reader can get their trotters on their own copies of #3 and #4, plus there’s an additional copy of #3 for one lucky runner-up! Each month the story was self-contained so you’ll not be missing out on anything and can simply kick back with a bottle of fresh air and laugh until your sides are sore with John Carnell and Andy Lanning’s inept detectives’ adventures, set in the funniest post-apocalyptic world you’re ever likely to see.

Just like last month you have 14 days to scour the blog for the answer to the following question:

Q – What licenced comic did The Sleeze Brothers’ creative team work on that’s also appeared on the blog?

When (you think) you’ve got the answer you can either email it to me at oink.blog@icloud.com (all emails will be deleted after the winner has been selected, I’m not fancy enough to have a newsletter or anything), or use the contact form you can find on the right-hand side of your desktop screen or under this post on mobile. Your entry must be with me by midnight on Friday 14th March 2025.

After this date I’ll contact the winners to ask for their postal addresses, so don’t be sending that yet. Unfortunately, due to rising postage costs the competitions are only open to UK and Ireland readers. If you win I’ll ask if you could take a photo of you with your prize for inclusion in next month’s competition post. You don’t have to, but you do get to show off if you do.

Please note, as per the photo above, the covers to these issues do have some wear and a bit of discolouration. This is how they originally arrived from eBay.

There’s now a menu page available for you to see the previous competitions and winners if you’re interested in seeing what you’ve missed out on and who the lucky people were. As you’ll be able to tell from the image at the top of the menu page I’ve a pile of doubles from various comics titles covered on the blog, so make sure you check back on the 1st of each month to see what’s next and good luck if you’re entering this month.

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Comic Reviews, New OiNK Material, OiNK Contributors

AGEDLY ACE: PSYCHO GRAN iN ACES WEEKLY

26 February 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

If you’re unfamiliar with this logo it belongs to the digital anthology comic, Aces Weekly, the creation of its editor David Lloyd (V for Vendetta, Wasteland, Knight Rider) and Bambos Georgiou (The Real Ghostbusters, Knights of Pendragon, Spider-Man). Every volume contains a variety of strips from across a wide spectrum of creators and genres, with each of these volumes consisting of seven weekly 20-page issues designed specifically for your iPad, computer or TV and you can purchase a full volume for only £6.99 (€7.99). That’s £1 per issue!

There are over 70 volumes in total so far and one of OiNK’s fan favourite characters has appeared on a handful of occasions along the way. David Leach’s Psycho Gran began (her late) life back in #15 of OiNK and, alongside her own print publications, she also makes the leap into the digital world now-and-again in Aces Weekly. That’s just what’s happened recently with a brand new three-page strip called Tiger! Tiger!

Pig pals will instantly be trying to work out why she’s pouring a powdery substance onto the road in the middle of the night . Of course, nothing she’s innocently doing at the beginning of a strip is ever really all that innocent, and any OiNK fan will know those police officers are about to find out! I obviously won’t ruin the surprise, but even if you’re only wanting to read this one strip it’s worth the entrance fee of one issue on its own! Yes, you have to buy a complete volume of Aces at a time, but you’ll get your money’s worth with up to 150 pages for the price!

As I said though, this is far from her first appearance in the comic. Some previous strips (again, I’ll only show quick previews) include Dog Toffees which sees the little old dear taking her flight-capable dog Archie for a walk in the park when someone approaches her to ask for a doggy bag for their own pooch’s plops. For anyone unfamiliar with Psycho Gran it’s an innocuous beginning, but we know better don’t we? Just like her pages in OiNK, David’s strips never fail to surprise with where they end up!

Fantastic Voyage II was a rather topical outing for ol’ Psycho when it was released during the Covid pandemic, and quite literally there’s something in the air. But don’t fret about her age. Don’t fret about her unknowingly walking into danger. Don’t even fret about the fact the virus has easily entered her body. If there’s anything we know about her it’s that she can hardly be described as vulnerable. In what ends up feeling like something akin to a hilarious cross between Psycho Gran and Jeremy Banx’s Burp, you’ll love the outcome of this one!

Billed as a Christmas horror story, Confessions of Psycho Gran sees her head off to the local church to speak about her sins. I think it’d take a whole 20-page issue of Aces Weekly to fully cover this lady’s confessions but, brilliantly, the focus of the strip is on the poor priest who’s just there to listen and forgive. As you can see from this first page it appears she’s taken quite a toll on him. Just a little bit. It’s a darker story than usual even by Psycho Gran standards, but as always it’s laugh-out-loud funny.

These last two samples may not actually feature Psycho Gran much (or at all) on the pages I’m showing you, but fans will already feel her presence in their set ups and will surely look forward to seeing her impact in both. Still Waters takes place at the local swimming pool where Gran is enjoying a paddle in the swim lane. None of the other swimmers want to share it with her but one man isn’t having it, he’s paid for his swim time and so pushes through, jumping the entire queue and into the water. I’m not even going to hint at what comes next but it’s a brilliant final page which I personally found particularly funny, and it includes a nice nod to a classic comic star.

In conclusion, what are you waiting for? You should get yourselves over to the Aces Weekly back issue page where you can scroll down and find each volume that contains David’s brilliant creation. Alternatively, he’s also personally published a whole bunch of Psycho Gran’s digital strips in the third issue of her Comics Cavalcade physical comic, a review of which you can check out on the blog. Between that and a subscription to the simply superb Aces Weekly you’ll never miss out on a bit of psychotic happiness.

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Comic Reviews, Transformers: Generation 2

TRANSFORMERS GENERATiON 2 #6: WHAT’S NEW iS OLD AGAiN

23 February 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

It’s Opposites Day in Marvel US’ sixth issue of Transformers: Generation 2. The six-page back up strip Tales of Earth is up first, with the main, 16-page The Gathering Darkness starting on the very next page. The shorter story’s build up must be coming to its climax and melding into the main story. But even more excitingly than that, the human co-stars who started this whole series return.

That’s right, G.I. Joe are back! With Bludgeon’s Decepticons levelling city after city across the globe it was only a matter of time until they were the only appropriate human response. But they’re not happy! First though, writer Simon Furman’s back up kicks off with an explanation at last from Megatron as to his choice of Deceptions to resurrect. Although, what he says is more like proof he was right after the fact, rather than the reason he chose Starscream in the first place.

It’s a bit better than, “Because it’s a Transformers comic and it wouldn’t be the same without our tête-à-tête, and they reissued his toy so I had no choice. All hail Hasbro!” Tales of Earth ends with the page below and the return of Optimus Prime to our planet at last. I love how this momentous moment is completely undercut with Duke’s response to his arrival. Derek Yaniger’s art is perfect for this comic once again and I love his rough-and-ready depiction of the Joes.

Standing in the flattened Capitol, Hawk lists a handful of major world cities all destroyed by the Decepticons. I’d no idea this comic went this far! It makes Prime’s reasoning all the more ridiculous though, especially when he just stands there and watches Starscream shoot down a G.I. Joe jet with its pilot still inside. While he states every human life lost weighs on his “already overburdened conscience”, he suggests that an assault by the Autobots would aggravate the situation. I think that ship has sailed!

There aren’t many Decepticons and the majority of the damage was done by their ship in space, which is one big target! It’d be an easy win (especially given how easily the Autobots do win their battle later), but the threat of Jhiaxus is so great that Prime wants to talk to Megatron instead. Is this going to come down to putting differences aside or they’ll all die again? This feels somewhat overdone by this point after the first generation. Although we do get to see Prime fighting his way to Megatron through Tantrum, a fan-favourite Predacon and it was great to see them again after their terrific Marvel UK stories.

Penciller Manny Galan, inker Jim Amash and colourist Sarra Mossoff really do pull out all the stops with the set pieces here, I can’t deny that. Still loving Richard Starkings’ and John Gaushell’s speech balloons too. So it’s already not going to plan for Prime, but surely he should’ve known that would happen? Then again, his actions so far (or rather, lack thereof) feel like he’s forgotten about his promise to our planet and the people on it, so maybe he’s had a bump to the head and thought Megatron wouldn’t obviously betray him.

Unfortunately, this is immediately followed by another issue I have with this chapter. Megatron defeats Prime far too easily and his plan is so basic, and accomplished so effortlessly, I can’t help but wonder why he never did it before now? With Optimus down he rips open the chest of the Autobot leader and connects a siphon to drain the Matrix of its power which he can then use to raise a new Decepticon army.

I do like the fact Prime has a mouth in behind his plating. It reminds me of how the live-action movies depicted him and the cheer that came out of the audience (and me) when his plating slid out in battle. But why does he have teeth? Anyway, I’m getting distracted, so back to the story. A few pages earlier Grimlock and Prowl were arguing (as always) about what to do and Prowl reminded the Dinobot leader that Optimus wanted to go in alone to prove the gravity of the situation to Megatron.

Obviously this didn’t sit well with Grimlock (who now has a speech pattern that’s a combination of the original UK and US comics) but orders are orders, right? Well, this led to that inner thought about orders above. On the opposite page to that is the image below which you can’t help but notice upon turning the page, resulting in that thought above being superbly funny!

What follows are a few pages of good old-fashioned fighting between a lot of the classic characters from the earlier days of the original comic, so they’re a blast to read. Even the art continuing not to show transformations (instead showing a ‘before’ and ‘after’ image of the character in the same panel) can’t dampen what is an exhilarating battle. In the end the Autobots win, naturally, and the Decepticons tractor beam themselves off Earth, taking the drained Matrix energy with them. Again, they could’ve done this in the beginning!

The last two pages hark back to the gathering darkness of the title. Prowl recycles a line from the cartoon movie as Prime gives us a hint of what battles we should expect in coming issues. I’m going to guess Megatron takes on Jhiaxus’ Decepticons and the Autobots have to come to their rescue. Of course, when I try to guess what’s going to happen in my comics I’m hoping my guess is always wrong and that I’m going to be surprised instead. Speaking of surprises, the people of Fara get a particularly nasty one.

This darkness reminds me a lot of both the void creatures Skids battled in the Marvel UK comic and the corrupted Matrix when it took over Thunderwing in the later issues of the original run. This kind of sums up this issue for me. It’s just too familiar. The nostalgia is welcome in the battle between the opposing sides but elsewhere it feels like a well-trodden path. It’s still enjoyable, in the way that catching a repeat of Knight Rider on TV is enjoyable even though my complete Blu Ray set is on a nearby shelf.

I own the complete Marvel UK run of Transformers G1 and admittedly am reading Generation 2 just after finishing it instead of a few years later, but it still feels a bit too much like a repeat in its overall story and some of its character moments. Unfortunately, there’s also a sense of trying to rush through the plot to get to a certain point, such as with Prime’s sudden disregard for us and Megatron’s ease at gaining the power of the Matrix. Had word reached Simon that the comic wasn’t going to be the ongoing epic he’d envisioned?

Nostalgia isn’t always a good thing

As a result this is the weakest issue so far. The fact it’s still so enjoyable from the nostalgia point of view speaks volumes to the high quality of this series as a whole. This is the first issue of the second half of the run, so I’ll be interested to see if it continues at this pace in order to reach a proper ending. Before I go, an advert in the middle of the comic caught my eye to prove that nostalgia isn’t always a good thing.

To say that’s a problematic advert is a bit of an understatement. In these more enlightened times it’s quite a shock to see it in a kid’s comic. It doesn’t exactly send the right message about women to any young boys reading, does it? I remember the TV show (and the movie it was based on) but I’ll admit I never watched it. From what I’ve heard she actually taught the boys a lot about women throughout the series, but even when I was the exact target audience it never sat right with me, maybe because there were a lot of girls in my friends circle.

Anyway, as I close this latest issue and see that front cover by Derek again I lament how the inside didn’t quite match up to its promise. If the plot having too many convenient things happen is to ensure we’ll reach a proper ending point before cancellation then it’ll go down as a necessary evil. Let’s see how things pan out when Transformers: Generation 2 #7 hits the blog on Sunday 30th March 2025.

iSSUE FiVE < > iSSUE SEVEN

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