Life After the Big Bang

« The Transformers: More than Meets the Eye #4 »
"Life After the Big Bang"
Publisher	IDW Publishing
First published	April 18, 2012
Cover date	April 2012
Story by	James Roberts
Art by	Alex Milne
Colors by	Josh Burcham
Letters by	Shawn Lee
Editor	John Barber
Continuity	2005 IDW continuity
Chronology	Current era (2012)

A mysterious transmission lures Ratchet, Drift and Pipes to the quarantined medical facility of Delphi, where Autobots are crying themselves to death...

Synopsis

At the Autobot medical facility of Delphi on the planet Messatine, First Aid has begun to write a journal chronicling what he believes will be the last days of the outpost. After granting asylum to two Militant Monoform Movement-aligned Genericons with a branched spark on the run from the Decepticon Justice Division, Delphi has been beset by a terrible plague...a plague that sees its victims cry themselves to death...

Celebrations, meanwhile, are underway aboard the Lost Light, as Autobots gather in Swerve's newly opened bar to celebrate finding themselves on the map. Ratchet and Swerve talk privately about a strange occurrence the previous night; both former subscribers to Fisitron's "Wreckers: Declassified" datalogs, the pair have just received a new datalog, which should be impossible, given that the author is dead. Although appearing to be only a string of random numbers, Ratchet recognized the data as medical statistics from Delphi, which reveal a bizarre trend: a constantly escalating death rate that has seen precisely half the outpost's patients die every month. Realizing that someone is trying to send him a message and that they are currently close to Messatine, Ratchet gathers up Drift and Pipes for an excursion to the facility, hoping that it is nothing, and—with his own irreplaceable hands growing increasingly worn out—that he will be able to appoint its commanding officer Pharma as new chief medical officer of the Lost Light in his place.

As this goes on, Ultra Magnus brings the news to Rodimus that Tailgate has decided he wants to be a Decepticon. With Magnus growing increasingly frustrated over his inability to enforce wartime laws in peacetime, Rodimus decides to have Rewind give Tailgate a supercompressed history lesson, projecting the key moments of the war directly into his mind. Horrified by what he has seen, Tailgate realizes the foolishness of his choice, and immediately goes to take out his frustrations on Cyclonus, whom he believes gave him a twisted view of history to make him look a fool. Unfortunately, he makes the mistake of punching Cyclonus on the arm, provoking violent retribution from the ancient Cybertronian, who silently smashes him to the ground, kicks him, and leaves.

On Messatine, Ratchet's team arrives at Delphi, discovering its main door marked with a gigantic red X. Pipes—over-impulsive due to the fact that this is his first time on another planet—smashes the door down before Ratchet can explain that the symbol warns of plague, and the little Autobot suddenly finds himself knee-deep in corpses, and in the path of a shambling, infected robot. Drift leaps to the rescue, slicing the plague carrier to pieces, at which point First Aid arrives to explain that, following a mysterious "big bang" five days prior, the facility has been infected by the Red Rust virus which liquefies its victims optics-first. Detailing their suspicion that the plague is the result of a chemical warfare bomb detonated by the D.J.D., First Aid leads them to ward manager Ambulon, who suspects that Delphi's medics have been uniquely resistant to the infection, and further explains that long-term patients are likewise unaffected. First Aid requests Ratchet's input on a new process he has developed, using a healthy spark to jump-start an ailing one, that he hopes to use on one of the outpost's prominent coma patients, but Ratchet is more concerned with consulting with Pharma.

Pharma, unfortunately, was inside the facility's quarantine room when the big bang occurred, and has been automatically sealed inside and unable to communicate through its thick glass. As everyone is regarding his predicament, Pharma burns a message into his own hand, warning the assembled Autobots that, behind them, Pipes has succumbed to the plague. Drift keeps Pipes busy while Ratchet hacks the quarantine room lock and frees Pharma, but the Autobot samurai is splattered with some of Pipe's liquefied innards and he too falls prey to the Red Rust. Ratchet and Ambulon rush to do what they can as Pharma runs off to the holding cells, claiming that he has figured out what has happened, only to be greeted by the two Genericons, freed by parties unknown via a remote override. The two Decepticons corner the Autobots in the emergency ward, preparing to end them, but First Aid pipes up: he has gone ahead with his experimental process using his own spark, and successfully revived a very angry, fighting-mad Fortress Maximus!

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Others
First Aid (1) Ambulon (2) Pharma (5) Chromedome (6) Rewind (7) Skids (8) Sunstreaker (9) Highbrow (11) Ratchet (12) Swerve (13) Trailbreaker (14) Powerglide (15) Ultra Magnus (16) Rodimus (17) Drift (18) Pipes (19) Dent (20) Backstreet (22) Dodger (23) Fortress Maximus (25)	Sonic (3) Boom (4)	Bob (10) Tailgate (21) Cyclonus (24)

Quotes

"Either it's very far away, or you've invented the world's smallest drink."

—Ratchet

"Don't say I'm irritable. It really—it really irritates me."

—Ultra Magnus

"You know, Ratchet, one day you'll say something nice to me—just before you tell me I've got a terminal illness or something."

—Drift, on his relationship with Ratchet

"That cross on the wall? The one you just ignored? It's the universal plague symbol. It means "stay the hell away" in a billion languages. It does not mean "ram-raid a morgue"!"
"Hands up who thinks this trip's just taken a slight turn for the worse."

—Ratchet and Drift

"I know this guy. His name was Prowl."
"Prowl?"
"Not the Prowl, obviously. This Prowl changed his name to... Dent, I think, to avoid confusion."
"Dent? He called himself Dent? As in—as in dent?"
"Yeah, well, all the best names are taken."

—Ratchet and Drift

"Pipes, I presume?"
"What gave it away? Was it the pipes?"

—First Aid and Pipes

"I gave you the briefest overview of the war through the eyes of an outsider. You're the one who wanted to pick a side. Bad guys and good guys... do you really think life is as straightforward as that?"

—Cyclonus, mocking the entire fandom through Tailgate.

"Do you two realize where you're standing? No? Then let me explain. My name is Fortress Maximus. Five years ago I was attacked by a Decepticon so powerful he redefined the word. He took me down. Hard. I was paralyzed, lobotomized, and left for dead. All of which means that right now, you two—you two Decepticons—being the very first Decepticons I've encountered since I was all but beaten to death—are standing in the very worst place in the universe."

—Fortress Maximus

Notes

Continuity notes

• As with past issues, many story elements mentioned in James Roberts's earlier IDW works Last Stand of the Wreckers and "Bullets" continue to return to play here, with Delphi, Pharma, and Ambulon all getting their first pictorial appearances. In a silent but specific reference to the events of "Bullets", First Aid is shown to have given Dodger's Autobot badge pride of place among his collection after he found a message from Agent 113 embedded in it.
• The Militant Monoform Movement and the Transformer god Adaptus (suggested in this issue to be the god of transformation) were both previously mentioned in Robert's other IDW work, "Chaos Theory".
• In "Chaos Theory Part 1", Megatron refers to ancient apartheid over whether you were constructed cold or forged; here, we learn that forging is somehow associated with Adaptus, as Ratchet has to deny that he sees divine involvement in why forged Transformers make the best medics.
• Skids's mysterious gun disappears from his hand between pages 4 and 5. Although a few previous issues have contained errors that saw the gun left out, this time it is no mistake, as issue #7 would go on to establish that Chromedome has palmed the weapon from the tipsy theoretician.
• Fortress Maximus has been offline since the events of Last Stand of the Wreckers.
• First Aid mentions the phrase "life persists", likely in reference to Datalog 332 of Wreckers: Declassified, which Verity Carlo completed in Last Stand of the Wreckers after Ironfist's death. First Aid was previously established as being a subscriber in "Bullets".
• Many key points of Cybertronian history are mentioned during Rewind's speech. Those include the fall of the Grand Imperium, Zeta Prime, Declaration Day, the Fall of the First Five Cities, Vos, Tarn, Helex, Kaon, Tesarus, Hell's Point, the resurgence of Triple M, the Simanzi Massacre, the Endless Retaliation, the rise of the Constellate, Starscream's attack on Luna 2, Soundwave's anti-neutral pogroms, Bludgeon's army, and the Five Dark Epochs: the Uprising, the Exodus, the Remote Age, the Cataclysm, and the Surge.

Transformers references

• Ratchet, Drift, and Pipes ride MARBs on Messatine, a kind of transport previously used by Ratchet way back in the Marvel comic story, "Repeat Performance!".
• Though a little hard to tell, what with him being all dissolving and the like, Dent's head design and the rather leonine sculpt to his chest seem to be references to the Beast Wars Prowl toy as a nod to their shared name, albeit in green, rather than yellow.
• Pipes has a retractable visor that covers his two eyes, allowing him to switch between his toy-based and character model looks.
• The panel where Cyclonus backhands Tailgate is a reference to one of Alex Milne's previous works, a panel of Megatron hitting Bumper in Megatron Origin issue 2

Other trivia

• A preliminary title for this issue was "The Weeping Dead".
• The concept of a branched spark is another Roberts-ism introduced in Last Stand as a trait of the Jumpstarters, with whom the two Genericons in this issue share some design cues.
• Tailgate's history lesson takes "11.3 seconds", another of James Roberts's many uses of the number 113, in reference to the issue of the Marvel UK comic that hooked him on the series.
• Pharma claims that, for all they know, the Genericons could transform into Class 3 Ruination Tanks.

Errors

• On page 14, panel 4, First Aid saying "started" is misspelled "stared".

Soundtrack

• "The Next Life" by Suede
• "Smokers Outside the Hospital Doors" by Editors

Foreign localization

Japanese

• Title: "Sore wa Big Bang Kara Hajimatta" (それはビッグバンから始まった, "That Began After the Big Bang")

Swedish

• Title: "Livet efter den stora smällen" ("Life After the Big Bang")

Covers (3)

• Cover A: Ratchet, Drift, and Pipes on Messatine, by Alex Milne and Josh Perez.
• Cover B: Pipes, reflected in Drift's sword, by Nick Roche and Josh Burcham.
• Cover RI: Ultra Magnus by Marcelo Matere and Priscilla Tramontano, the first half of a combined image formed with the RI cover to Robots in Disguise #4

• 
  M.A.R.B.s!!!
• 
  Pipes can't catch a break.
• 
  Deal with this!

Advertisements

• Robots in Disguise #4
• Cold War
• Nevsky: Hero of the People
• Free Comic Book Day
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Micro-Series #4: Leonardo
• Popeye

Reprints

• The Transformers: More Than Meets the Eye Volume 2 (October 17, 2012) ISBN 1613774982 / ISBN 978-1613774984
  • Collects More than Meets the Eye issues #4–8.
  • Bonus material includes art from most covers, "Meet the Crew" and "Meet the 'Cons" pages.
  • Trade paperback format.

• The Transformers: The IDW Collection Phase Two: Volume 1 (September 3, 2014) ISBN 1631400401 / ISBN 978-1631400407
  • Collects The Death of Optimus Prime, More than Meets the Eye issues #1–3 & #4–5, and Robots in Disguise issues #1–5 & #6.
  • Hardcover format.

• Transformers: More Than Meets the Eye Box Set (December 2, 2015) ISBN 1631404741 / ISBN 978-1631404740
  • Collects More Than Meets the Eye volumes 1–5.
  • Bonus material unknown at this time.

• Transformers: The Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 53: Liars, A to D (December 26, 2018)
  • Collects More than Meets the Eye issues #1–6, and Spotlight: Trailcutter & Hoist.
  • Bonus material includes an all-new interview with James Roberts, rare archive material from the dawn of More than Meets the Eye, Alex Milne's sketchbook, a cover gallery and a forward by Simon Furman.
  • Hardcover format.

• Transformers: Mer än ögat kan se (June 15, 2019)
  • Collects More than Meets the Eye issues #1–8 & Annual 2012, Spotlight: Trailcutter & Hoist, and a special illustrated edition of "Bullets".
  • Swedish reprint. Hardcover format.

• 
  More Than Meets the Eye Volume 2 – cover art by Alex Milne and Josh Perez
• 
  The IDW Collection Phase Two: Volume 1 – cover art by Saren Stone
• 
  More Than Meets the Eye Box Set – cover art by Marcelo Matere
• 
  The Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 53: Liars, A to D – cover art by Don Figueroa (Whirl) and Alex Milne (retro)
• 
  Mer än ögat kan se – cover art by Alex Milne and Joana Lafuente.