The Next Best Thing to Being There!

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When there's no more room in hell, the Constructicons will walk the Earth.
"The Next Best Thing to Being There!"
Publisher	Marvel Comics
First published	July 1985
Cover date	November 1985
Writer	Bob Budiansky
Penciler	Ricardo Villamonte
Inker	Brad Joyce
Colorist	Nel Yomtov
Letterer	Janice Chiang
Editor	Mike Carlin
Continuity	Marvel Comics continuity

The Autobots must stop the Decepticons from sending a message to Cybertron. But the Decepticons have a rather large surprise for them...

Synopsis

Remember the Construction robots? Like the green guy? The green and purple guy? And, uh..."square-mouth"?

Shockwave succeeds in creating the first of his new generation of Decepticons—the Constructicons. They immediately depart with Soundwave on their first mission, to build a transdimensional radiowave scrambler with which to contact their home planet of Cybertron.

Prowl gives G.B. Blackrock a tour of the Ark. Along the way, they encounter the homesick Huffer, who's been focused on repairing the interstellar comm system instead of his primary assignment. Blackrock offers the Autobots a way to spy on the Decepticons within Blackrock's aerospace plant using a bugged telephone system. They are interrupted, however, by an inter-Autobot radio message from Bumblebee, who they learn of the attack by Laserbeak and six mysterious construction vehicles on the aerospace plant and send a team to intercept them.

Elsewhere, Sparkplug Witwicky returns home from his heart attack, and is surprised to find that Buster has actually cleared out the repair shop's entire backlog of automobiles. Buster wonders how to explain to his father his recent experience with Optimus Prime, and the subsequent powers he's gained.

Near the site of the Constructicon project, trucker Bomber Bill looks forward to a return home after a long assignment, but his truck is stolen by the Constructicons as raw material for the scrambler. Determined to get home, Bomber Bill attempts to follow the thieves, and meets the Autobots on the way. Huffer offers a lift to the human.

The Autobots attack the Constructicons, who reveal their ability to combine into the super-robot, Devastator. The others distract the slow-witted giant, but Huffer hesitates to destroy the scrambler, which he sees as a rare chance to contact home. The delay is enough time for Soundwave to charge the scrambler and begin sending his signal to Cybertron; Bomber Bill destroys the scrambler, but most of Soundwave's message goes through. Their mission accomplished, the Decepticons retreat. Huffer thanks Bomber Bill for his help, but laments that while the trucker can go home now, he can't.

At the aerospace plant, Shockwave discovers that Optimus Prime may no longer possess the Creation Matrix. If this proves true, Shockwave no longer has any reason to allow Prime to live. The Autobots, listening in from the Ark, are helpless.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Humans
Optimus Prime (1) Prowl (12) Bluestreak (13) Brawn (14) Ratchet (15) Jazz (16) Sunstreaker (17) Huffer (18) Bumblebee (19) Hound (26) Ironhide (27) Sideswipe (29) (see below)	Shockwave (2) Scavenger (5) Mixmaster (6) Long Haul (7) Bonecrusher (8) Scrapper (9) Hook (10) Laserbeak (20) Jetfire (21) Soundwave (28) Devastator (30)	Ferdy and Gabe (3 & 4) G.B. Blackrock (11) Sparkplug Witwicky (22) Buster Witwicky (23) Bomber Bill (24) Ethel (25)

Quotes

"Devastator, you miswired clod! Get over here and destroy this Autobot before he ruins everything!"
"Destroy... Destroy Autobot... Destroy Autobot... which one... not these Autobots..."

—What Soundwave and Devastator have here is a failure to communicate!

"Fellow Autobots... I ask you to forgive me for my poor judgement. I... I allowed my longing for beloved Cybertron to blind me. I don't know if I can ever make up for my mistake."
"We all drive off the road sometimes when it comes to wantin' to go home, Huffer! Ain't nothin' else that can eat at your insides like that feelin'! ...We're all the same, big buddy! We suffer from the same achin' and we all make mistakes!"
"You're right, Bomber Bill -- except we're not quite the same. You can go home now... I can't."

—Huffer and Bomber Bill

Notes

Continuity notes

• Ferdy and Gabe previously appeared in issue #7.
• A footnote reminds readers that G.B. Blackrock entered into his alliance with the Autobots last issue, during which Jazz sustained the injuries he is having repaired in this story (but see "Errors," below).
• Sunstreaker is revealed to be damaged to the point this his recovery is uncertain, the result of Shockwave blasting him in issue #5 as an example to Megatron, which explains his absence from the Autobot line-up last issue.
• Sparkplug Witwicky is released from hospital following the heart attack he suffered in issue #4.
• The narration notes that Cybertron is now "hundreds of light years away"; previously, in issue #1, the planet orbited Alpha Centauri, only four light years away, but has been floating freely through the galaxy for the last four million years after being shaken from orbit.
• The UK original story "The Wrath of Guardian!", published a few issues before the UK comic reprinted this issue, was written with knowledge of this story's content, and so was able to includes a few plot points and concepts introduced in it, giving UK audiences their first look at them ahead of time: namely, Sunstreaker's grave condition, the Constructicons' cuboid brain modules, and the fact that Optimus Prime's headless body is standing around in the Ark.
• Bot Roster:
  • Autobots: 21 active; Sunstreaker inactive; Optimus Prime held captive (23 total)
  • Decepticons: 16 active as the Constructicons are brought to life; Megatron missing in action; Jetfire awaiting activation (18 total)

Continuity and plotting errors

• The brain modules have changed in appearance from the small spheres they were in the previous issue to small cuboids. Future issues will stick to a look more akin to the original one.
• Shockwave makes the strange claim that the brain modules have been "fully enlarged." Was this meant to say "fully energized"? There's no indication of a size change, and no explanation if offered for what all the plant equipment is doing when it turns and zaps the modules, and this would make all that make sense.
• Scavenger's alternate mode is called a "truck crane" on page 4; that's Hook's alternate mode, Scavenger is a power shovel. Additionally, Scavenger is rather oddly treated as leader of the Constructicons, speaking for the group upon their activation and being addressed with orders for the team by Shockwave. Other media treats Scrapper as the group leader, and in fact, the speech bubble giving the order to the team to transform is seen coming from Scrapper rather than Scavenger.
• Jazz is described as having "lost an arm" in battle, but both his limbs were intact at the end of last issue. He was seen cradling one at the end of the story... but it was his right arm last issue, and he's shown having his left replaced in this one!
• When Shockwave created the Constructicons, he made their brain modules first and only created their bodies this issue. Why does he create Jetfire's body first, before knowing that he'll be able to put life into it? Weirder still, he then tries to have Prime infuse Jetfire's body with life before it has even finished being constructed.

Artwork and technical errors

• Continuing an error that's been running for the past several issues, Optimus Prime's head is drawn missing its ear-antennae. The first few pages of this issue double down on the off-model rendering, depicting it as sort of a round generic lump, lacking any of its usual helmet shapes.
• Compounding the Prime errors, in every panel except for page 1, and the final panel of page 22, Optimus's eyes are left uncolored white instead of their usual yellow.
• Ferdy's baseball cap was purple when he last appeared in issue #7, but has changed to green in this issue.
• The Constructicons are inconsistently colored throughout the issue, all in a variety of incorrect ways that don't match their finalized comic color schemes. They're all green, purple, and black, and it's all in basically the right places, but a lot of details like wheels and thighs and helmets are repeatedly left out or miscolored on all six.
• The half-completed Jetfire doesn't really look like Jetfire, aside from being a jet and having his colors; he's also got a very pointy nosecone that might be the result of the unfinished body being drawn based on his earlier, more toy-based character model, which would be discarded and replaced for his finished appearance in the series.
• Continuing an intermittent error, G.B. Blackrock is once again missing his mustache this issue.
• The center of Prowl's forehead crest is consistently colored red like the crest's wings, when it should be white like the rest of his helmet.
• Page 6
  • Panel 2: The sides of Ratchet's helmet are white instead of red.
  • Panels 2 & 4: Jazz has individual eyes peeping out from under his visor! In the big picture, this isn't strictly an error, as many different artists in the future of the series and brand in general will vary the precise way Transformers with visor-eyes are drawn—but in isolation, this does feel like a case where the artist didn't quite understand how Jazz was meant to look. Rather than an eye-shield, his visor is drawn to look more like it's part of his helmet, like the peak of a cap.
• Page 7, panel 2: Prowl's crest is colored white instead of red.
• Page 13:
  • Ironhide is colored like Ratchet, and Jazz is drawn and colored instead of Bluestreak.
  • The narration calls for Sideswipe, though he never shows up, either in this panel, or in the rest of the issue. Additionally, his name is misspelled as "Sidesswipe", with a double-s.
• Hound's got a weird splash of orange on his grill.
• Page 15, panel 2: The Autobots are rendered as a group of generic vehicles.
• Page 16, panel 4 - Bluestreak is drawn and colored as Prowl (and not even correctly, as his crest is all-white); the collection of transforming shapes next to him is unrecognizable as an Autobot, but it's colored like Bumblebee, who it's definitely not.
• Page 17:
  • Panel 1 - Bluestreak is drawn as himself but still colored like Prowl, and he's missing his door-wings.
  • Panel 2 - Bumblebee has headlights on his shoulders, making him look a bit like a miscolored Bluestreak. The lineart is so vague, that's what he might actually be; he's got the same feet as Bluestreak does in the previous panel, but he does look to have Bumblebee's head.
• Page 18, panel 2: Ironhide is colored like Devastator, and Prowl is once again drawn and colored in place of Bluestreak.
• Page 19, panel 2: Bumblebee is actually a yellow-and-blue Windcharger; Bluestreak is drawn as a generic.
• Page 20, panel 3: Soundwave's head has been strangely stylized throughout the issue, but it goes full-blown bonkers off-model in this panel, including an incorrectly-colored dark purple mouthplate that continues onto the next page.
• Page 21:
  • Panel 5: One more Prowl-as-Bluestreak.
  • Panel 6: Both Prowl and Bluestreak appear together, with Prowl missing his door-wings, and Mirage has suddenly appeared, when he shouldn't be there.
• Page 22, panel 3: Optimus's eyes are uncolored white again.

UK printing

Issue #35:

• Back-up strips: Machine Man ("Rime of the Ancient Wrecker!" Part 1), Robo-Capers and Matt and the Cat
• Page orders were changed for the UK printing to provide a more effective "cliffhanger" ending for issue #35. US page 11 (ending on Bomber Bill showing Ethel photos of his kids) was printed before pages 9 and 10. A caption was also removed from the last panel of page 10.

Issue #36:

• Back-up strips: Machine Man ("Rime of the Ancient Wrecker!" Part 2), Robo-Capers and Matt and the Cat
• Issue #36 of the UK comic included "Robot War II", the second in an irregular series of text features summarising events seen in the comic so far.

Covers (3)

• US issue #10: Devastator smacking down the Autobots, by Kyle Baker.
• UK issue #35: Shockwave creates a Constructicon brain, by John Ridgway.
• UK issue #36: reuse of art from US cover.

• 
  US issue #10 - Devastator was momentarily distracted by the tiny dancing Bluestreak on his fist
• 
  UK issue #35 - Muahahahaha!!!
• 
  UK issue #36 - Ramp up the lime green, folks!

Reprints

• 
  The Transformers Comics Magazine #5 (Marvel US, 1987)
• 
  Transformers: New Order paperback (Titan Books, 2003)
• 
  Transformers: New Order hardback (Titan Books, 2003)
• 
  Classic Transformers Volume 1 (IDW Publishing, 2008)
• 
  The Transformers Classics, Vol. 1 (IDW Publishing, 2011)

=IDW edits

For The Transformers Classics series of trade paperbacks, IDW Publishing "remastered" the coloring of the series with varying degrees of success. These changes were sometimes to fix errors, but often to alter characters' color schemes to make them resemble their toy and/or cartoon selves, and were rarely applied with consistency. IDW's recolored version was also used for Hachette's Definitive G1 Collection.

• As is standard for the series, Soundwave is recolored into his cartoon/toy blue, erasing his standard Marvel purple color scheme.
• All instances of Optimus Prime's eyes being left uncolored are corrected.
• Page 4, panel 3: Haphazard text recreation results in Scrapper and Hook's names now being misspelled "Scraprer" and "Mook."
• Page 13, panel 3: Ironhide's colors are corrected (though he still has a blue-black front bumper/grill). Hound's headlights are inexplicably colored-in.
• Page 18, panel 2: Ironhide's colors are correct.
• Page 20-21: The recoloring of Soundwave corrects his mouthplate to silver-white on page 20, but not on page 21, where it is now dark blue instead of dark purple as in the original error.

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