A 'Bot and Her City

« The Transformers: Windblade #1 »
"A 'Bot and Her City"
Publisher	IDW Publishing
First published	April 16, 2014
Cover date	April 2014
Written by	Mairghread Scott
Art by	Saren Stone
Letters by	Chris Mowry
Editor	John Barber
Assistant editor	Rebecca Huard
Continuity	2005 IDW continuity
Chronology	Current era (2014)

While continuing her efforts to help Metroplex heal, Windblade's growing distrust of Starscream leads her into some explosive trouble.

Synopsis

Six months after the defeat of Shockwave and the foiling of his attempt to fulfill the Dark Cybertron prophecy, Metroplex has become the only city left standing on Cybertron, in which the inhabitants of the ruined Iacon now live, still governed by Starscream. But Metroplex remains damaged, making life difficult for those who now dwell within him, and so Starscream employs Windblade for her talents as a Cityspeaker to communicate with the Titan and work towards effecting repairs.

On the morning of her 186th day on Cybertron, Windblade watches the sunrise with a wistful longing for her homeworld, Caminus, before heading off to meet with Starscream over the latest problem, a series of rolling blackouts within Metroplex. Chromia surprises her with an impromptu weapons training session, which she loses quite quickly, and the pair then receive Starscream and Rattrap for the meeting. Chromia and Rattrap are "invited" to stand outside—where Rattrap gets no response from Chromia when he tries to make some small talk about their unusual gender—and once they have gone, Starscream quietly threatens Windblade, suspecting that she may be deliberately undermining his leadership by working with Metroplex to cause the various problems in the city. As Starscream and Rattrap then depart, Chromia makes her dislike of her new leader known, but Windblade admits that his frustration is not exactly misplaced: they have thus far failed to remedy the blackouts.

Consulting with Metroplex, using her talents to read the patterns of light across his brain module, Windblade traces the problem to a diversion of power at junction T134. The only problem is, neither she nor Chromia have any idea where that junction might be, so they realize they will have to seek out the one 'bot who might: Ironhide, whose faith has been shaken by the fact that Shockwave's scheme has created undeniable contradictions in the vision of the future he saw, and who now wanders the depths of Metroplex hoping to find answers. Chromia complains, finding the old 'bot "mopey", but gets visibly alarmed when Windblade teasingly suggests she'll pass on the sentiment when she finds him. Jetting off into the bowels of Metroplex, Windblade soon tracks Ironhide down, and he points her in the direction of the junction she needs, beneath the Acrolight District. Curious about Starscream, Windblade asks Ironhide for his opinion on the Seeker-turned-politician, and he suggests she would be better served asking his former Decepticon comrades, rather than his old enemies.

Windblade and Chromia meet back up to explore underneath the Acrolight District, but several hours of searching only get them as far as junction T127. Chromia insists they call it a night and resume the search in the morning, but rather than go home, Windblade decides to pay a visit to Maccadam's Old Oil House, where she is warmly welcomed by owner Blurr. After a couple of drinks, she asks the various patrons for their views on Starscream, and the universal opinion quickly becomes clear: everyone hates him because he's only out for himself.

This learning experience unnerves Windblade, and Chromia can tell right away that something is bothering her when they meet the next morning to continue their search. Before they can talk over the matter, however, a huge explosion erupts out of the access shaft they are about to enter, gravely damaging Windblade, though she still fights to grab an orange wire she spots poking out of the rubble before collapsing. Taken in for repairs, Windblade dreams of her homeworld, Caminus... though Caminus is more than just a planet. It—or rather, he, her dreams reveal—is one of the Titans, who left Cybertron in the planet's murky prehistory, settling on a planet that his city-form spread out across, where he gave birth to a new generation of Transformers from the hot spot within him. The vagaries of fate caused Caminus and his people to lose contact with Cybertron, but Windblade—one of Caminus's Cityspeakers, raised on tales of their ancient homeworld—was thrilled when Thunderclash arrived on their world and recruited them to help heal the damaged Metroplex. But her hopes of a joyful reunion with a peaceful Cybertron that would help the Camiens and grow with them together have been dashed... because the explosion, Windblade realizes, was Starscream's doing, a deliberate attempt on her life, perpetrated by Rattrap. And as the city leader enters the med-bay, she realizes he is certain to try again...

Featured characters

Characters in italic text appear only in flashbacks.
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Others
Windblade (1) Chromia (2) Metroplex's brain (3) Ironhide (6) Slug (11) Thunderclash (17) Nautica (18)	Starscream (4) Rattrap (5) Blurr (7) "Tall Tankor" (8) "Fat Tankor" (9) Fizzle (10) Swindle (12) Waspinator (13) Sky-Byte (14) Circuit (15) Caminus (16)

Quotes

"Millions of years of planet-wide civil war, and no one killed that guy?"

—Chromia on Starscream

"This is a Dinobot-Demolishor?! It's an insult! I've had four and I can still see!"

—Slug on liquor, in more ways than one

Notes

Continuity notes

• Ironhide's vision of the future, as seen in issue #31 of the 2009-2011 ongoing, showed future generations of Autobots living on the planet Gorlam Prime. The events of "Dark Cybertron" saw Gorlam Prime destroyed, causing the contradiction that has sent Ironhide astray.
• We got a crack about the shared name of Generation 1 Tankor (aka Octane) and Beast Machines Tankor back in Chapter 6 of "Dark Cybertron"; this issue shows us they have buddied up, and are being called "Tall Tankor" and "Fat Tankor" ("not to his face") by others to distinguish them.
• Caminus and other Titans are revealed to have contained hot spots, the wellsprings of Transformer life that were introduced in More than Meets the Eye #17.
• After all the fuss over the introduction of new female Transformers into the previously genderless-except-for-the-forcibly-reassigned-Arcee IDW continuity, Windblade, Chromia, and Nautica's gender is addressed with the simplicity of a single seven-word caption: they evolved that way over time. Windblade vol. 2 #1, however, would reveal that gender was present on ancient Cybertron and that Solus Prime, female member of the IDW Thirteen, lived on Cybertron with Caminus before he founded his namesake colony.

Transformers references

• Chromia being loudly concerned about Windblade telling Ironhide what she thinks of him seems to allude to the fact that the pair were romantically linked in the original The Transformers cartoon.
• Fizzle's appearance in Maccadam's owes something to his original bio, which mentioned a predilection for "cheap fuel"; Dreamwave's More than Meets the Eye profile for him widened that into his being a bit of a bitter drunk, and he's certainly indulging here in the self-aggrandizement both bios describe.
• The injured Windblade bleeds blue energon, like that seen in the Prime cartoon, as opposed to the more traditional purple-pink energon that we've seen throughout IDW's history. Evidently, this is another distinction between Cybertronians and their Camien descendants.

Real-life references

• Blurr mistakenly calls Windblade "Wingblade" before being corrected; this being a previously used Transformer name, tons of fans across the internet regularly made the same mistake for a few months after the character was debuted.

Errors

• Several characters, including Blurr and "Tall Tankor" (Octane), who had given up their factions are shown wearing Autobot or Decepticon sigils.
• Back in Chapter 8 of "Dark Cybertron", Nautica tells Magnus they joined the Vis Vitalis and then ran into Alpha Trion days later, whilst here they say they were recruited by Thunderclash to fix Metroplex. Unless Thunderclash had a premonition then this clashes.
• On page 21, the words "happy reunion" in panel 2 are supposed to be emphasized, but the "h" is not, resulting in an unsightly "happy reunion".

Trivia

• While Caminus's robot mode does not appear in this story, Windblade's narration explains that her kumadori-style "face paint" is based on Caminus's own visage, and is something worn by all Cityspeakers to show their devotion to him.
• This issue's story is followed by a letter from Mairghread Scott welcoming readers to the book.
• Similar to the pre-launch promotion for More than Meets the Eye and Robots in Disguise two years prior, this series was trailed by a "scavenger hunt" for a series of six promo posters that were released to various sites around the internet: Windblade on IDW's Facebook page, Blurr on Seibertron.com, Chromia on TFormers.com, Ironhide on The Underbase podcast's Twitter, Rattrap on TFW2005.com, and—belatedly released five days after the issue's publication—Starscream on The TransMissions podcast's Twitter.

• 
  "Voiceless"
• 
  "Aimless"
• 
  "Homeless"

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  "Faithless"
• 
  "Ruthless"
• 
  "Powerless"

Covers (3)

• Standard cover: Windblade, by Casey Coller and Joana Lafuente
• Subscription cover: Windblade reflected in her sword, by Saren Stone
• Incentive cover: Windblade, by Livio Ramondelli, part of a three-piece image alongside More than Meets the Eye #28 and Robots in Disguise #28.

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• IDW: Getting Into Your Head for 15 Years (back cover)

Reprints

• The Transformers: Windblade (October 1, 2014) ISBN 1631400525 / ISBN 978-1-63140-052-0
  • Collects Windblade (2014) issues #1–4.
  • Bonus material includes a cover gallery.
  • Trade paperback format.

• The Transformers: The IDW Collection Phase Two: Volume 6 (October 18, 2017) ISBN 1684050855 / ISBN 978-1684050857
  • Collects Dark Cybertron #1, More than Meets the Eye issues #23–27, and Robots in Disguise issues #23–27, Dark Cybertron Finale, and Windblade (2014) issues #1–4.
  • Hardcover format.

• Transformers: The Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 64: Windblade (August 9, 2017)
  • Collects Windblade (2014) issues #1–4, and The Transformers (2012) issues #35–38.
  • Includes a bio for Windblade, an overview of her conception, pictures of her Thrilling 30 toy, early design sketches by Hasbro, a cover gallery and an intro by Simon Furman.
  • Hardcover format.

• Transformers: Windblade - The Last City (February 14, 2018) ISBN 978-1684052240
  • Collects Windblade (2014) issues #1–4, and Windblade (2015) issues #1–7, but not the alternating chapters of Combiner Wars from The Transformers vol. 2 needed to complete the story. Um.
  • Bonus material includes covers from each issue.
  • Trade paperback format.

• Transformers: Best of Windblade (December 7, 2022)
  • Collects Windblade's first appearance from More than Meets the Eye #26: "Burning Bright: Dark Cybertron Chapter 8", Windblade (2014) #1: "A 'Bot and Her City", Till All Are One Annual 2017: "The Chosen One", and Transformers (2019) #9: "The Cracks Beneath Your Feet Part Three".
  • Bonus material includes an art gallery.
  • One-shot format.

• 
  Windblade – cover art by Saren Stone
• 
  The IDW Collection Phase Two: Volume 6 – cover art by Marcelo Matere and Tom B. Long
• 
  The Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 64: Windblade – cover art by Guido Guidi and Saren Stone
• 
  Windblade - The Last City – cover art by Sara Pitre-Durocher
• 
  Best of Windblade – cover art by James Biggie

External links

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