Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen Review
SPOILERS

Transfromers: Revenge of the Fallen is devestatingly entertaining. I saw the midnight showing of The Movie at Orlando Universal Citywalk on Wednesday. The military scenes are golden perfection. I found myself wanting to fast forward through a lot of the Witwicky shtick and spend more time with Lennox, Iron Hide, Epps, and Sideswipe. The climactic battle had everything giant robots are about: Heroes fending off a seige of evil bots with the fate of the world caught in the crossfire. Give the heroes tanks and giant robots of their own and I get one of my new favorite movie battles.

Optimus Prime and Megatron are the real standout characters who get much more characterization than the first movie, even with Optimus being out-of-commission through a good chunk of the movie. Starscream also got some nice screentime. I wish I could trade in some of the Witwicky family's screentime for more Op, Megs, and Screamer. In ROTF many classic characters are expertly updated yet still have the 'heart' of the originals. Soundwave and Ravage are handled beautifully, especially Ravage attacking the All Spark storage facility. I absolutely love Jetfire. An engaging, likable character with a great origin and hints of the original character: he is a Decepticon turncoat who values life and freedom.


My main complaint is the low-brow humor, which I don't find humorus. I had the same complaint with the first movie. I just don't want my giant fighting robots associated with that kind of stuff. I know why the filmmakers added the potty humor, it got lots of laughs in my theater and it gives the film the edginess teenagers so desperatly search out in their quest to feel grown-up. Even as a teenager I never had a desire to assert my maturity with immature humor. Class it up a bit.


Overall, Revenge of the Fallen deserves it's position among modern action hits. I may do a more extinsive review and anlysis later but I wanted to get my initial thoughts online.

I was honored to be asked to appear at JACON, May 22-24, as a featured talent. They had seen my Grimlock art on display at Megacon earlier this year and wanted me to bring some Transformers art to JACON because Gregg Berger, the voice of the original G1 Grimlock and Skyfire, and Stan Bush, performer of "The Touch" and "Dare" from Transformers: The Movie, were appearing as special guest.


I did two prints specially for JACON. The first, in honor of Stan Bush, is "Transformers Rock!" which features Optimus Prime, Bumblebee, Arcee, and Grimlock in a band rockin' on stage. Optimus, standing in for Stan Bush, has the same style of guitar as the one on the cover of Stan Bush's first album/CD. I also gave a small print of it to Stan Bush.


The second JACON piece is an acrylic portrait of Grimlock, in honor of Gregg Berger. Painted on canvas, it is a somewhat stylized portrait of the lovable and violent Dinobot. A print of it was auctioned for charity. I also gave a small print of this one to Gregg Berger.


I had a couple of special moments at the "Dare" panel, an all things Transformers discussion, on Sunday. The panel had Stan Bush and Gregg Berger, host Tom Croom (of Wasabi Anime) and Joey Snackpants (from the Snacktime Online PodCast), and "fan representative" Chris Duplis.

At the panel, they gave away five special items. Hasbro had shipped to the con four Revenge of the Fallen toys weeks before they were available at retail. A pair of Bumblebee VoiceChanger Helmets and a pair of Leader class RotF Optimus Primes. They also gave away a large (32x24 inches) print of my "Transformers Rock!" piece (yay!). To win my print about 15 attendees made the "transforming noise" and the host chose the best performance to receive my print.

Before that, they called me up to talk about the print, which I was totally not expecting and not ready for! I stumbled through explaining the inspiration (Stan Bush's appearance at the show) and the media (inks with computer colors). Then, I was describing the characters and instrument choices and when I said, "...and Grimlock on drums," Gregg Berger said, in the Grimlock voice, "Me Grimlock Bash Drums!"

Stan Bush also screened the music video for his new version of "The Touch." I've heard a lot of complaints but I liked it. However the real highlight was on Saturday night when Stan Bush performed a live concert. He did several of his new songs and, of course, "The Touch" and "Dare." Awesome.


I still have a few of my large art prints available. All are on heavy paper and suitible for framing with a classy white border. "Transformers Rock!" print is huge at 32x24 inches and priced at $100. The color on it came out really nice. The Grimlock Portrait Acylic Painting print is 22x28 inches and $70. Prices do not include shipping and handling. Also these pieces are fan art and are not endorsed or authorized by Hasbro/TakaraTomy (or Stan Bush and Gregg Berger ).


I want to thank Tom Croom and Jeffery Jones for inviting me and the whole JACON staff and volunteers for all the help they provided throughout the convention. Thank You!

I'm so excited! I have my first artist alley at Megacon this weekend! I have a bunch of my fan art, mostly Transformers because that's what I've been doing alot of this last year. If you're at Megacon come on over and say, "hello." I'm in black section, table 18. I'm right on the end of the row.

In other exciting news I had a nother Transformers: Mosaic piece post yesterday. "No Surprises Here" stars the alligator Headmaster, Skullcruncher. No Surprises Here" is written by Josh van Reyk, with colors by John-Paul Bove, letters by Franco Villa and pencils and inks by me.

IDW GI Joe #1
Fan Review by Aric.


G.I. Joe has literally been a lifelong passion for me. I had G.I. Joe figures when I was younger than the recommended minimum age. So I am quite excited that a new vision of the 'Joe mythos is opening with the launch of IDW's G.I. Joe comic line.


I have been very pleased with IDW's handling of the Transformers and Star Trek comics and I expect great things from this newest set of anti-terrorist sci-fi adventures. IDW's G.I. Joe #1 was released on January 14 and I'll review it after a quick overview of the new G.I. Joe comic line.


The first Force Recon was already deployed in October with G.I. Joe #0 (yes, I'm using bad military puns. I'm having fun. Get over it.). G.I. Joe #0 contained three short stories that introduced the storylines and creative teams of the three initial G.I. Joe titles. The three titles are G.I. Joe (ongoing) which launched this month with it's first issue; G.I. Joe: Origins, Larry Hama's origin story (duh), first issue coming next month; and G.I. Joe: Cobra, where a Joe operative goes undercover within the ranks of Cobra, set to have the first issue in March.


G.I. Joe #1 is a complete reboot and introduces a whole new continuity (G.I. Joe comics have been published off and on since 1982 with most of them taking place in the same continuty.). G.I. Joe #1 has a lot of what has come to be expected of first issues since the tradepaperback economy entered prominence in the comics field: lots of introduction, scrawny plot. We willl have to wait for a couple of issues of plot Physical Training and judge the story is after it's put on some weight.


So far, the main event is that the crew of a frieghter was killed, appearantly by a box. There are strong allustions that the box is related to Cobra (a B.A.T. box, maybe?). The rest of the issue is introductions for various characters. Scarlett is a leader and seems to head-up daily operations at the G.I. Joe's base, the PIT, as well as overseeing intellegence gathering and analysis (which matches the Primary Military Speciality listed on her action figure's file card much better than the last continuity's Scarlett.). She has a nice dynamic with Duke, who doesn't do much more than banter with her and Beachhead. Beachhead has some kind of massive memory loss (which gives new meaning for his code name.).

Snake-Eyes shares his intro with what could turn into a very interesting character, an assassin who spontaneously dissolves into dust without so much as a finger being laid on him. Cobra super-science gone-wrong? Hope so! The assassin is very similar in appearance to Wraith, a charcter created by the last company to hold the G.I. Joe licence. IDW Editor-in-Chief posted on IDW's message board that the character is not Wraith but it's interesting that the assassin looks so similar. He's such a light weight that you breath on him and he dissolves. Interesting. We shall see how this unfolds...

G.I. Joe #1 is written by Chuck Dixon, with pencils by Robert Atkins (no, not that Atkins). After Dixon was announced as the writer on G.I. Joe I looked up his name and realized he has written some of my most favorite comics, including the early issues of Punisher: War Zone (the early '90s series), the tragically short lived pirate yarn, El Cazador, and one of my fav Star Wars mini-series, General Grievous, among others.

So to wrap it up, if you want sci-fi military action check out G.I. Joe #1 by IDW. It's out now. I will refrain from typing "Yo Joe" in all-caps followed by many exclamation marks. Thank you.

Wow. I had wondered how deviantART sites got left without updating for months at a time. Now I know. Sorry for being off the grid for so long. I've been super busy, working on several projects and drawing constaintly. I have some Transformers fan art ready and I'll reveal more about the other projects over the next several months.

I've also had some Transformers: Mosaics pieces debut while I've been away. The first one was released way back in the summer. "Dark Times Ahead" stars Hot Rod with cameos by Kup and Warpath. The story, written by Rene Woudstra, is set just before the 1986 movie. The second Mosaic, "Thoughts," stars Jetfire (in his super cool Classics/IDW configuration) contemplating his place in the IDW-verse. Story by Martin “Tron-program” Fisher, colors by Ian “Botmaster” Lea, and letters by Dstinct.

Hope to see you around!