War World: Awakenings
From Transformers Wiki
| |||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
| "War World: Awakenings" | |||||||||||||
| Publisher | IDW Publishing | ||||||||||||
| First published | December 30, 2020 | ||||||||||||
| Cover date | December 2020 | ||||||||||||
| Written by | Brian Ruckley | ||||||||||||
| Art by | Anna Malkova | ||||||||||||
| Colors | David García Cruz | ||||||||||||
| Letters by | Jake M. Wood | ||||||||||||
| Editor | David Mariotte, Tom Waltz and Riley Farmer | ||||||||||||
| Continuity | 2019 IDW continuity | ||||||||||||
Optimus Prime gets to grips with his new role as Autobot leader by seeking counsel from a controversial source, while Megatron confronts a figure from his past.
Contents |
Synopsis
The past: Termagax watches the Tether collapse from the balcony of her tower before deciding that it's time for her to act, and promptly orders her house to manufacture something for her.
The present: inside the White Tower prison complex, a hesitant Froid watches as Pyra Magna exits her secure stasis chamber. The former Great General can hardly believe that Sentinel Prime has suddenly authorized her release, and Froid points out that he didn't—Optimus Prime, the new leader of the Autobots, has made the decision. Meanwhile, Optimus himself, still finding his feet as Autobot commander after accepting the Matrix of Leadership, addresses the crowd who have gathered under his command at Autobot headquarters, and makes his points clear: although none of them seek war, Optimus will do everything in his power to safeguard lives and protect the innocent from tyranny. And, if that means taking up arms against Megatron and his Decepticons... then he will fight.
Across Iacon, Megatron himself deals with a similar set of burdens as he and his Decepticons plan their next moves. Ratbat criticizes Megatron's reckless decision to send the Rainmakers after Sentinel Prime, but Strika shuts him down: what's done is done, and now that the Decepticons have seized power they must convince the citizens of Cybertron to recognize their legitimacy. Megatron has no intention of ruling from the old Senate building, and tells Strika to turn the building into a prison for the Senators within; in the meantime, they must tighten their control over Iacon's infrastructure—factories, academies, the Titan Hub, and the intelligence division. To make any kind of progress, they must turn the 'bots responsible for their day-to-day operation to the Decepticon cause, but most of them are more devoted to their jobs than to any political ideology... with one glaring exception. Ratbat confirms Megatron's suspicions—Starscream wants a word with the Decepticon leader.
Having recovered and interred Sentinel Prime's body, Optimus seeks counsel from Ironhide regarding his recent decision to release Pyra Magna. Ironhide points out that many Autobots will disapprove, including members of the Senate Guard, but Optimus remains adamant that they need an experienced tactician on their side. With Strika a Decepticon and Ultra Magnus missing in action, they need a military strategist to provide counsel; Prime will not recklessly throw any more lives away, and although he still doesn't know all of the answers... the least he can do is try to do the right thing.
At the top of the White Tower, prison warden Roadmaster watches as Pyra steps out into the sunlight for the first time in kilocycles before meeting with Chromia. Though Roadmaster remains uneasy, Chromia admits that Pyra fought harder and longer than anyone else during the War of the Threefold Spark, and in the face of Decepticon tyranny they may very well require that same kind of vigor once more. Before Pyra seeks counsel with Optimus, however, she has one thing she must do first: once Roadmaster shuts off the prison's comms blockers, the general sends a long-range transmission across Cybertron and contacts her old lieutenant Jumpstream, who promptly drops everything and uses her teleportation power to jump across the surface of Cybertron—over the Cybertronian Mountains, across the Rust Sea, all the way up onto the tower itself to finally kneel before her beloved leader. Roadmaster and Chromia are disturbed by Jumpstream's fanaticism, and when Pyra commands her lieutenant to track down the other "Companions", their concern only grows...
Elsewhere in Iacon, roving reporter Andromeda races toward the highway to investigate a mysterious communications blackout in the city of Tarn, until a hologram of Soundwave cuts her off and orders her to report to Decepticon headquarters to meet with them. Elsewhere in the city, Crasher's Decepticon patrol sweep the streets, while Battleslash and Roadtrap discuss the prospect of Sixshot taking over from Skytread as leader of the Decepticon Guard, meaning that they completely fail to notice Cyclonus, eager to settle his score with the Decepticon six-changer, lurking in the shadows.
At Decepticon Headquarters, Starscream's meeting with Megatron starts out on the wrong foot and only gets worse. Arrogant as ever, the spymaster's antics push Megatron's patience, and his overconfidence soon lands him in over his head when he taunts his old colleague Soundwave and gets blasted against the wall. Tired of these games, Megatron simply points his fusion cannon at Starscream and orders him to tell him everything he knows—and although Starscream sputters that he knows something about the Titans and the Enigma of Combination, he doesn't get any further before Skytread barges in, bearing some unexpected news: Termagax has returned, and she is not happy!
In the old gladiatorial arena, Termagax delivers a furious speech to the assembled Decepticons: her movement was founded on ideals, not the violence and anarchy that Megatron has unleashed upon Iacon. But it's Megatron who strides onto the arena floor to cut her off—the difference between them is that while she gave up, he didn't. His remarks finally make Termagax realize the truth about her old mentee—he never truly cared about the sanctity of her cause, or genuinely improving Cybertron... and everything Megatron has ever done as leader of the Ascenticons has been about him and him alone. Termagax knew that the Ascenticons could only win if they convinced Cybertron to choose a new path, not force it upon them—but that's as far as Termagax gets before Megatron unloads his fusion cannon upon her. Convinced he's vanquished the last remnant of his past, Megatron tells his Decepticons that their course is set... only for Ratbat to reveal the truth: that wasn't the genuine article! "Termagax" was merely a mindless spectrosynth drone, remotely controlled by the real Termagax from the safety of her fortress; as she orders the construction of another drone, she decides to relocate, and transforms her tower into a mobile fortress that stands up and strides off into the wasteland...
Featured characters
Characters in italic text appear only in hallucinatory form.
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Autobots | Ascenticons/Decepticons | Others | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
|
|
Quotes
"And who is Optimus Prime?"
"Well, that's something I'm sure a great many of us are curious to discover."
- —Froid and Pyra Magna
"I know that you are here because you feel compelled to stand against what is happening. And I know that you are looking to me for answers. But you should also know that I am not as I was. I have seen... I am not certain what I saw. Nor what answers I can give. I remember that Megatron and his followers... whatever happens, they remain of us. We are parts of a whole. I have no wish to fight, since it can only be a fight against ourselves. But I will. If that is what it takes to save lives, to prevent something worse... if there is truly no other choice, I will fight."
- —Optimus Prime
"We should mourn Sentinel Prime. He was flawed, as we all are. Perhaps he failed. But he faced a choice, when the Matrix came to him. And in that moment, he chose to try."
- —Optimus Prime
"Just so you know, I'm not on board with this ridiculous idea."
"You amaze me, Roadmaster. Isn't it every jailor's ambition to see their most famous prisoner released, then? Of course, you've got so few inmates up here, perhaps you'll be out of a job soon ayway."
- —Roadmaster and Pyra Magna
"How stupid of me not to have seen it long ago. It's not about the cause. It's about you. Self-elevation. Self-glorification. You mislearned every lesson I tried to teach. Look at you, standing there, with that cannon on your arm. What are you doing? Fighting another war? Cybertron had to choose a better future, you fool."
- —Termagax
Notes
Continuity notes
- This story takes place more or less concurrently with the events of the first issue of the Transformers: Escape miniseries, and features several characters from that story in minor roles—Hoist, Ratchet, Nautica, Hound, and Gutcruncher. With this in mind, we can probably assume that Hound and Nautica have their adventure in the A'ovan habitat at some point after attending Optimus Prime's first speech, while Gutcruncher returns to Decepticon headquarters to see Termagax following his encounter with Hoist and Ratchet.
- The prologue on page one picks up after Vigilem's destruction of the Tether back in issue #17. In #18, Arcee warned that the planet's orbit would wrap the Tether around its equator like a ball of twine, and Termagax observes such a phenomenon taking place as the cable contours itself over the landscape.
- Optimus mentions that they do not know when Ultra Magnus will return to Cybertron; thanks to issue #12 of Galaxies, we know that, thanks to the space-time distorting properties of the Black Sphere system, he and the crew of the Fist of Iacon have been delayed by at least seventy cycles after rescuing Alpha Trion from Soundblaster.
- Pyra Magna at last! Aaaaaaaaaall the way back in issue #3, Froid mentioned a mysterious patient—one of his "four substantial failures"—who he had been barred from visiting; Pyra was first namedropped in issue #8, but this is the first issue to reveal that they are, in fact, the same person. In issue #2 and #9, we flagged up some individuals who shared Pyra Magna's distinctive teal-and-red color scheme; as we suspected at the time, this was not a coincidence, as Jumpstream notes that she and many others deliberately adopted Pyra's colors as a combination protest and tribute to their leader.
- Cyclonus has been looking for Sixshot to settle a score for some time now; in issue #17, he learned from Hot Spot that Sixshot had deliberately destroyed the Memorial Crater which he had taken it upon himself to guard.
- Starscream and Soundwave have quite the history: in issue #14, we learned that Starscream had somehow ousted Soundwave from his position as the head of Cybertronian Intelligence. Judging by his behaviour here, Soundwave's been nursing a grudge for some time!
- Starscream promises some intel regarding to the Enigma of Combination and Titansparks. The Enigma was last seen in Termagax's custody in Galaxies #1; we learned from a blurb in issue #18, meanwhile, that the Well of All Sparks had not produced a Titanspark in many cycles, but why this is so is not yet clear...
Transformers references
- Back in issue #12, a frustrated Road Rage told Nautica that she only knew two Cybertronians capable of teleportation. While one was almost certainly Skywarp, it wasn't clear at the time who the other one could be, but this issue reveals that Jumpstream possesses a similar ability. She was noted to possess this power in her bio, but never displayed any such ability in the original IDW continuity.
- Pyra Magna's jailer Roadmaster began as a one-off character created for issue #43 of More than Meets the Eye, though she later made a few background appearances during the Unicron crossover event.
- As Jumpstream teleports to meet with Pyra Magna, she passes a roaming skitter, briefly lands on an immersant Titan, and overlooks the Sea of Rust on her way to the White Tower.
- Obsidian puts in an appearance on page sixteen standing next to Lugnut. Rather than the hovering, skeletal shape he used in both Beast Machines and Till All Are One, however, he's wearing a body based on his 2013 BotCon toy, a humanoid form that appeared in that year's "Termination" comic.
- A hunchbacked Decepticon in the crowd on on page seventeen is drawn and colored to resemble Scatterspike from the 2015 Robots in Disguise cartoon, specifically her Warrior Class toy.
- Termagax's spectrosynth drones are probably a reference to "Spectrosynth", the stage name of undercover Autobot actor Clipshade from the 2015 Robots in Disguise comic.
Real-world references
- Termagax's fortress possessing chicken-esque legs for locomotion is likely inspired by the similar house of Baba Yaga, witch of Slavic folklore.
Errors
- On page four, Ratchet is again depicted with a red chevron and different shoulder details as he was in issue #19, while his appearance in Escape #1 gives him a toy-accurate black crest.
Other trivia
- Originally solicited for the first week of December, this issue arrives almost a month late, the latest in a series of ongoing delays from IDW.
Covers (3)
- Cover A: Megatron on the rampage, by Freddie E. Williams II & Jeremy Colwell
- Cover B: Pyra Magna and Jumpstream, by Billie Montfort
- Retailer incentive cover: Megatron blasts Termagax, by Alex Milne
Advertisements
Reprints
- Transformers Volume 4: Declaration of War (January 19, 2022) ISBN 1684058066 / ISBN 978-1684058068
Volume 4: Declaration of War – cover art by Cryssy Cheung
