Fight! Super Robot Lifeform Transformers: Victory (manga)

Japanese Generation 1 continuity « Victory » Toyline (Japan) Toyline (China) Cartoon Manga Story Pages Commercials

Running in TV Magazine from April 1989 to January 1990, the Fight! Super Robot Lifeform Transformers: Victory (戦え!超ロボット生命体 トランスフォーマーV Tatakae! Chō Robot Seimeitai Transformers Victory) manga lasted for ten issues, all of which were written by Masumi Kaneda and featured artwork by Ban Magami.

The Victory manga is a distinct anomaly amongst the Generation 1 Transformers manga series. Like Super-God Masterforce before it, the Victory manga was independent of the anime, telling its own story, whereas all the previous manga had supplemented the TV shows, weaving between their episodes. However, while the Masterforce manga essentially told a variation of the anime's storyline, hitting the same basic plot points and themes and employing characters in the same manner, the Victory manga is a completely different story from the anime. Additionally, while the other mangas (Masterforce included) had very little in the way of continuing story, focusing more on single-chapter tales, Victory has a very defined story arc running from beginning to end, focusing on Jan Minakaze and manga-exclusive character Solon Kitakaze.

All this is probably due to the fact that while Masumi Kaneda originated the original concept for Victory, the anime was headed up by Hiroyuki Hoshiyama. Consequently, it wound up going in a significantly different direction to the manga, where Kaneda was busy employing the original ideas that he had for the series. As one might expect from the creator of Super-God Masterforce, Kaneda's manga featured a particularly pronounced human involvement, with Solon, additional manga-exclusive character Patty Minakaze, and returning Masterforce characters Shūta Gō and Cab teaming up with Jan to create an armored group called the Victories. On an artistic level, the manga even employed different character designs than the anime, using Ban Magami's original designs for Jan and Illumina before they were modified for television, resulting in a distinctly different look for the pair.

This does not, however, change the fact that the manga could also be thoroughly bizarre at times, including such oddities as Deathsaurus being terrified of a caterpillar, four young boys wandering around in robot hot pants, and its infamous conclusion, featuring the first canonical appearance of female Decepticons and little tiny baby Decepticons.

«	Victory issues	»
#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10

Collections

• Fight! Super Robot Lifeform Transformers: The Comics (October 23, 2002)
• Transformers: The Manga Volume 3 (October 13, 2020)

• 
  Fight! Super Robot Lifeform Transformers: The Comics; art by Ban Magami
• 
  Transformers: The Manga Volume 3; art by Ban Magami

Notes

• In a post regarding the HasLab Deathsaurus campaign, a question was asked regarding if Esmeral was ever considered to be one of the milestones for the project. Designer Evan Brooks responded by saying that Hasbro and Takara don't actually own the rights to Esmeral or the rest of the Victory manga original characters.