G1 - Call of the Madbot - ENG

TRANSFORMERS: GENERATION 1
CALL OF THE MADBOT

Art by Jason Nangle

Story and lettering by me


NOTES

This comic is part of the Generation One Season 4 (an Italian Detour) project.

"Call Of The Madbot" is the first chapter of a miniseries set just before the events of The Rebirth (namely, Season 4 of the G1 cartoon).
As stated in that miniseries, the Decepticons were defeated after a major battle against the Autobots, that scattered them across the galaxy.
This battle was never chronicled in cartoons, as it should take place AFTER the final episode of Season 3, Return of Optimus Prime (part 2).

As I'm not very good at detailing battles, I chose to focus on the aftermath: with all his warriors damaged, Galvatron will have to resort to new mechs... namely, the new cast featuerd in The Rebirth.
But where did they come from? Answering this question is one of the goal of our miniseries.

The other 'Cons are not dead, but being rebuilt: in fact, some of them are featured in the final battle of The Rebirth (part 3)</b>.

Primacron is the weird, diminutive monkey-lizard alien featured in Call Of The Primitives and depicted as the "grey eminence" behind Unicron.
In our version, he is not the creator of Unicron, but simply a tool, equally controlled by Primus and Unicron: hence his name. He plays a role similar to the In-Betweener's of the Marvel Universe: the tip of balance between Order and Chaos.
When Primacron is "possessed" by the Unicron frenzy, he creates horrible things like Unicron itself (well, his body-form at least) or Tornatron.
When he is blessed by the Primus Touch, he creates things of life: the Primitives for instance.

The Plasma Energy Chamber is the forge that birthed the first Cybertronian: it was presumably used by the Quintessons, as they ruled the planet at the time, but we can theorize they had an external science consultant, during those distant ages...maybe, it was Primacron himself, under a different guise. Maybe, Primacron was deceiving them into creating the first Transformers because this was Primus' will.
The Key to the Chamber is guarded by the Prime dinasty, which keeps it hidden somewhere. At the beginning of The Rebirth, Galvatron knows exactly where and, later in the miniseries, it is revealed that Vector Sigma gave him the location: why and how, it's not explained. Our little comic does that!
But... is it Galvatron conning Vector Sigma, or the opposite?
Who is manipulating whom?

The quote "for all their supposed omnipotence..." comes from G1 Marvel US Galvatron: do you remember when and how Simon Furman made him think this line?
Yes, it's when Galvatron deceived (or so he thought) Primus into bringing all the Transformers back on Cybertron to fight Unicron. FULL CIRCLE AGAIN!

And I said that Primacron looked different: maybe, his vurrent lizard-monkey guise is just a disguise, a Pretender Shell. Maybe he is the one who invented the Pretender concept.

Vector Sigma is nothing else but a manifestation of Primus, of course, as the Plasma Energy Chamber is a means to control the AllSpark Creation Energies: full circle.

The "heralds" of Unicron in the last panel of the vision are some possible repaints I toyed with:
- Dark Matter (a blue Snarler)
- Gas Giant (a light blue Octopunch)
- Meteor Shower (an orange/green Catilla)
- Star Fusion (a red Carnivac)
None of them is a Pretender: they feature only the robot mode (and they can transform).
These Heralds are supposed to be created in the Chamber, but as you can imagine, Galvatron will do more than that when he manages to wrestle control of the process.

And he won't be alone: the following chapters will feature Grimlock (his BEST ALLY!), Primacron's Assistant, Pretender Starscream (In Thy Image).

Thank you for reading this whole rant: now, are you an artist and do you want to join? Let me know!!

Final note: the title is a mix of "Call Of The Primitives" and "Madman's Planet", but I replaced "man" with "bot". (Obviously).

"Call Of The Madbot" Originally presented as a Mosaic piece.