McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

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I just finished reading Drift 4, I swear to you that it took me less than 10 minutes to get through it, it is that mindless. It's awful, there's no story here at all, if this is what Shane McCarthy brings to Transformers then I'm sorry I picked up the Humble Bundle TF comics deal with so much of his work in it.

Dominic wrote:How is it "following blindly" to follow a writer who has delivered?

Roberts delivers the goods on "More than Meets the Eye". Why wouldn't you follow him to his next project? That is not blindly following, that is going where you expect to be rewarded. And, if the writer does not deliver the goods, then you can always drop the book.

(I really liked Gillen's run on "Iron Man" and his early run on "Uber". But, "Uber" indulged a little too much in "we are published by Avatar Press" style low-pitches. And, he has not impressed me on "Darth Vader". So, I am no longer following him as aggressively. Taylor has impressed the hell out of me with "Injustice". So, I followed him to "Superior Iron Man".)
What if he's writing a sequel to Maus? What if he's writing MLP? What if he's writing for the WWE comic? I don't care about those properties, I'm not going to follow a writer blindly to any old job.
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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

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There is a story. But, it is not terribly unique. "Exiled guy thwarts evil scheme and confronts another guy who could be have been him under different circumstances." Not bad. But, nothing that has not been done elsewhere, especially in this genre.

"All Hail Megatron" is good. It deviates from TF "standard", especially in the early chapters (which is what caused all the fantrums). But, it is good. "Spotlight: Cliffjumper" was anemic. Much like "Empire of Stone", it was not bad, but it was nothing unique. (You have already read it before, ya know?)


What if he's writing a sequel to Maus? What if he's writing MLP? What if he's writing for the WWE comic? I don't care about those properties, I'm not going to follow a writer blindly to any old job.
Depends on the writer. Guys like Morrison or Byrne tend to be consistent across properties. (You are reading them as much as you are reading the comic.) Guys like Gillen tend to change by property. (Gillen at Avatar Press is different than Gillen at Marvel.)

The WWE comic was not bad. I dropped it because they decided to gimmick basics like distribution, which is a major "no-no" in my book. But, I am still interested in seeing Foley expand as a writer.
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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

Post by BWprowl »

I had kinda the same reaction to Drifteos that I did, say, the new Ninja Turtles movie. It was...certainly a comic book! Yup, it definitely had pages, and art, and some characters. I think dialogue might have been involved at some point.

There were things I liked (the third issue in particular rose above 'decent') but overall, it was just kinda 'there'. Could almost pass for an above-average pack-in comic.

Re: Writers vs properties, it's like I always say, porque no los dos? Like, I grabbed those new Avatar comics coming out based purely on the fact that they were new Avatar comics, and I'm reading the Bravest Warriors comic for basically the same reason (it's got a rotating cadre of writers that I have no hope of keeping track of). On the other hand, a particular writer can make me pick up something I've never been into before. Hearing Ryan North's name immediately got me interested in Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, and I bought both New Warriors and Amazing X-Men because Chris Yost was writing them, despite never going in for either of those properties previously. Ditto All New Ghost Rider with Felipe Smith.

It extends past comics, of course. I ignored (and disparaged) Star Wars Rebels based on how crappy the trailer was, and because I was rather ambivalent about Star Wars at the time. Then as soon as I heard Greg Weisman was involved, I jumped right into it (Weisman also got me watching through all of 'Spectacular Spider-Man' back when I didn't even LIKE Spider-Man!). But I'm also annoyingly excited to check out TF RID15 based purely on the fact that 'It's Transformers!' and it's looking kinda cool.

And sometimes I just pick up new things for no particular reason, like Ms. Marvel, Lumberjanes, or like 90% of the manga I've ever started reading.
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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

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Hearing Ryan North's name immediately got me interested in Unbeatable Squirrel Girl,
I agree conceptually, but that is an example I just cannot endorse.

It extends past comics, of course. I ignored (and disparaged) Star Wars Rebels based on how crappy the trailer was, and because I was rather ambivalent about Star Wars at the time.
For me to give up on a property, I need to be consistently burned by it. And, "Star Wars" hits that mark.

In '06, a really good run of comics was turdified by a really stupid ending. I was not, I am not sure who was to blame. (Was it the writer? Was it Lucas Ltd? I honestly do not care.) The book went bad, and I was not going to trust Dark Horse "Star Wars" again, regardless of how much "Dark Times" intrigued me. I gave SW another chance with "Clone Wars" a few years later. The debut "movie" sucked. Purged out my SW stuff by 2011.

I only gave the "Darth Vader" book a chance because Gillen is on it. And, it did not hit the mark. Given how tightly controlled SW is, it is unlikely that the comics will ever be good enough to get me back.
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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

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JediTricks wrote:I just finished reading Drift 4, I swear to you that it took me less than 10 minutes to get through it, it is that mindless. It's awful, there's no story here at all, if this is what Shane McCarthy brings to Transformers then I'm sorry I picked up the Humble Bundle TF comics deal with so much of his work in it.
So is it worth me picking up the trade when it comes out, or is Empire of Stone skippable?
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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

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Not just skippable, I'd accuse it of being downright disposable. You really only need to read it if you ABSOLUTELY NEED to know what happened to Drift and Ratchet post-Lost Light, and I can't imagine all this stuff will be too relevant moving forward anyway.

Gigatron is in it, which is cool I guess, but he hardly has anything that made CR Gigatron amusing or entertaining, and is your pretty standard Big Bad Guy here.
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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

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Buy it to round out a haul, or if you specifically want new TF content. But, do not prioritize for it.

I do not regret buying it. But, I am not likely to buy the compilation (unless the compilation is cheap and/or has impressive back-matter).
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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

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Dominic wrote:There is a story. But, it is not terribly unique. "Exiled guy thwarts evil scheme and confronts another guy who could be have been him under different circumstances." Not bad. But, nothing that has not been done elsewhere, especially in this genre.
The story in issue 4 is literally "they fight a battle, Drift wins". All the setup, all the emotional toil and guilt over the possibility that his past could have led him to allow a deadly army to be used against the forces of good, none of it carries a lick of weight here, there's barely even lip service paid to that. It's not even competent on following through with its premise in earlier issues.
Depends on the writer. Guys like Morrison or Byrne tend to be consistent across properties. (You are reading them as much as you are reading the comic.) Guys like Gillen tend to change by property. (Gillen at Avatar Press is different than Gillen at Marvel.)

The WWE comic was not bad. I dropped it because they decided to gimmick basics like distribution, which is a major "no-no" in my book. But, I am still interested in seeing Foley expand as a writer.
That is a severe fanboy answer.

andersonh1 wrote:So is it worth me picking up the trade when it comes out, or is Empire of Stone skippable?
Honestly, there's nothing here for you. It doesn't inform on any character well, it doesn't have larger implications for anything (Ratchet is there to represent and tie into MTMTE, but nothing here affects the why of things to come, from what I can tell), the art doesn't do anything remarkable, and the overarching plot is barely a single issue's worth of content. It's weak setup and wasteful non-payoff.
BWprowl wrote:Not just skippable, I'd accuse it of being downright disposable. You really only need to read it if you ABSOLUTELY NEED to know what happened to Drift and Ratchet post-Lost Light, and I can't imagine all this stuff will be too relevant moving forward anyway.

Gigatron is in it, which is cool I guess, but he hardly has anything that made CR Gigatron amusing or entertaining, and is your pretty standard Big Bad Guy here.
You are exactly right, and you know how little we've been agreeing lately, so yeah, both sides of the aisle can say that.
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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

Post by Dominic »

That is a severe fanboy answer.
How is that a fanboy answer?

You are the one who said you want Transformers because....Transformers, prioritizing for that over something that might be good but not-Transformers.

The fanboy is the guy who blindly buys in a book because he wants to read about his favourite characters.

I said that knowing about and following creators is a better metric to use because it can be a good indicator of what you are getting in to.

I also pointed out that a company screwing around with distribution (as WWE/Papercutz did) is a problem (because it makes the books harder to get). The fanboy would just go ahead and jump through hoops.
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Re: McCarthy's new Drift book has Gigatron in it

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JediTricks wrote:
andersonh1 wrote:So is it worth me picking up the trade when it comes out, or is Empire of Stone skippable?
Honestly, there's nothing here for you. It doesn't inform on any character well, it doesn't have larger implications for anything (Ratchet is there to represent and tie into MTMTE, but nothing here affects the why of things to come, from what I can tell), the art doesn't do anything remarkable, and the overarching plot is barely a single issue's worth of content. It's weak setup and wasteful non-payoff.
There seems to be a consensus on this. Sounds like something to check out if I can find it at a major discount, but not otherwise.
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