Transformers (2023) issue 2: Difference between revisions
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* '''Seventh Printing Cover:''' by [[Eric Canete]]. | * '''Seventh Printing Cover:''' by [[Eric Canete]]. | ||
* '''Eighth Printing Cover:''' by [[Patricia Martín Samaniego]]. | * '''Eighth Printing Cover:''' by [[Patricia Martín Samaniego]]. | ||
* '''Transformers Battersea Seventh Printing Cover:''' by [[Simon Parr]]. | * '''Transformers Battersea Seventh Printing Cover A:''' by [[Simon Parr]]. Limited to 2,024 copies. | ||
* '''Transformers Battersea Seventh Printing Cover B:''' Black & White variant. Limited to 400 copies. | |||
* '''Transformers Battersea Seventh Printing Cover A:''' Spot foil variant. Limited to 1,000 copies. | |||
* '''Transformers Battersea Seventh Printing Cover B:''' Foil variant. Limited to 400 copies. | |||
<gallery> | <gallery> | ||
Revision as of 14:36, 9 November 2025
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 Once you pop, you can’t stop. | |||||||||||||
| Publisher | Image Comics Skybound Entertainment | ||||||||||||
| First published | November 7, 2023 | ||||||||||||
| Cover date | November 2023 | ||||||||||||
| Written by | Daniel Warren Johnson | ||||||||||||
| Art by | Daniel Warren Johnson | ||||||||||||
| Colors by | Mike Spicer | ||||||||||||
| Letters by | Rus Wooton | ||||||||||||
| Editors | Sean Mackiewicz & Jonathan Manning | ||||||||||||
| Continuity | Energon Universe | ||||||||||||
The Autobots must learn to adapt to Earth with scant resources, while the Decepticons gather more energon to rebuild their army.
Synopsis
Optimus Prime walks through a wood, marveling at the natural beauty of Earth. The plants, the animals, the scenery; he finds it all breathtaking. However, his serenity is interrupted upon hearing a crunch underneath his foot: he's stepped on a small deer, killing it. Optimus leans down, cradling the creature with remorse. Spike emerges from the woods and reassures Optimus that it was an accident. Optimus tells Spike that this world is so fragile compared to his own. Seeing the Autobot leader's despair, Spike decides to change the subject of the conversation and asks Optimus about his name. Optimus tells him that the Prime title denotes him as leader of the Autobots and was passed to him by the previous leader of their kind. Optimus in turn inquires about Spike's name, who reveals that his mom used to call him "Spikey" before she passed away due to his hair always sticking up as a child. Optimus is confused; he’s never heard the terms "mom" or "dad" before, though he does know the concept of "family." Spike then asks Optimus about where he comes from, prompting Optimus to tell him about Cybertron and the war between the Autobots and Decepticons that has raged for the past two centuries. The Autobots' forces eventually dwindled from the Decepticons' relentless onslaught to the point where they were forced to flee the planet aboard the Ark. However, their escape was attacked by Megatron and the Decepticons. The last thing Optimus saw before they crashed into the mountain was Earth. Optimus thanks Spike for assisting him during the battle, saying that he's not sure they would have escaped without him. Spike in turn offers condolences for Bumblebee.
Their somber heart-to-heart is soon interrupted by the newly reactivated Cliffjumper, whom Ratchet was able to successfully repair. Optimus warmly greets his old friend, but Cliffjumper is not nearly as taken with Earth as his commander, freaking out upon seeing Spike and Carly and bumping into the trees. Carly tells him to calm down. After all, if anyone should be freaking out about the giant robots from space, it's her. This gets Cliffjumper to calm down and the two shake hands. Inside the quarry, Ratchet has set about trying to revive the other Autobots, but has used up the last of their energon reserves fixing Cliffjumper. Optimus considers using the Matrix of Leadership to replenish their energon, but Ratchet says they can't. The Matrix is connected to Prime's own life force and if they lose him, they lose everything. Cliffjumper remarks that if they're running out of energon, the Decepticons will hopefully have the same problem.
Meanwhile, at the power plant Sparky and Davey work at, a police officer is surveying the damage caused by Starscream's attack and taking statements, not believing the plant manager's story about a giant robot. The officer says they'll get some detectives out here to investigate, but a panicked Sparky insists they need to call in the Army. As the officer tries to reassure Sparky, Skywarp drops from the sky, destroying his patrol car. Behind him descend Starscream and Soundwave carrying an energy transfer module stolen from the Ark, which will allow them to more efficiently convert energon from the plant. The police officer tries to shoot at Starscream, much to Sparky's protests, only for Starscream to step on him. As the Decepticons begin to drain the plant of its energy, Soundwave intercepts a transmission from the U.S. military asking a nearby pilot under the callsign "Frosting" to intercept their attack. Amused at the idea of the "squishies" trying to fight them, Starscream goes to intercept the fighter. He dogfights with them for a bit before transforming and smacking the jet down. The pilot and his ride-along eject, but Starscream catches up to Frosting and squashes him between his hands. The other soldier activates a button on his parachute, converting it into a winged jetpack. As Starscream advances, he pulls out his flare gun and fires at the Decepticon, getting a lucky shot at his eye before retreating. Starscream opts to give up on the minor annoyance and Duke flies away to fight another day.
Back at the plant, Sparky takes one of the patrol cars as he is chased down by Skywarp. Before he can catch the human, however, Frosting's F-18 comes crashing down on top of him and Soundwave, allowing Sparky to slip away. The resulting explosion is seen by the Autobots and Carly and Spike realize that the plant is under attack. Feeling responsible for bringing their war to this planet, Optimus opts to face the Decepticons, despite Ratchet's protest about their need to find their own energy sources. Optimus assigns Cliffjumper to stay with Ratchet and protect their sleeping comrades. Spike decides to come along to help his dad, which Optimus reluctantly allows. Carly tries to stop him, saying they need to get back home to their parents, but Spike insists. She decides to leave for home alone. As she drives back towards town, she is spotted by Laserbeak, who identifies the image of Optimus Prime Carly drew on her van earlier that day. She arrives home to find Sparky already there, dressed in his old Army fatigues and carrying several guns. Carly asks where her dad is, and Sparky answers that "they" killed him; Davey is dead.
Featured characters
Characters in italic text appear only in flashbacks.
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Autobots | Decepticons | Humans |
|---|---|---|
|
|
Quotes
Spike: "Um... Hi... Nice to meet y--"
Cliffjumper: "Ah, we're not there yet, my man. Yeeesh... You're like a turborat-- creepy, little--"
Carly: "Oh, please."
Cliffjumper: "Yeow! How many of you are there?"
Notes
Continuity notes
- Spike identifies the town he and Carly live in as Farmingham.
- Having been merely hinted at in the last issue, the flashback to the war on Cybertron gives us our first look at Megatron, though his whereabouts are still unknown. (#WhereIsMegatron)
- While mentioned but not seen last issue, this issue gives us our first appearance of Laserbeak, still out scouting for new sources of energy.
- This issue confirms what Jetfire alluded to last issue, that unlike most incarnations of the G1 story, the war has only been raging for two centuries instead of the more traditional four million years.
- Ratchet refers to deactivated brothers and sisters. While Arcee has previously been seen on the cover of the last issue (which confirms female transformers exist in this continuity), this issue implies she's not the only female Autobot aboard the Ark... though exactly who these other female Autobots are is currently unknown.
Transformers references
- Cliffjumper compares Spike to a turborat, a form of Cybertronian wildlife that first appeared in the fourth issue of Tom Scioli and John Barber's Transformers vs. G.I. Joe.
- The police cars of the FPD are quite clearly based on Prowl, retaining his Japanese police car color layout, twin red siren lights (as opposed to red and blue) and the “highway patrol” markings on the back (none of which really make sense on an American city patrol car, but we'll let that slide.)
- Furthering the reference, in Daniel Warren Johnson's Director's Commentary for this issue, prior to Mike Spicer coloring the pages it is seen that DWJ had given a "PROWL" license plate to the police car Sparky steals to escape Skywarp and Soundwave. The car's license plate is blank in the final release.
G.I. Joe references
- First Sergeant Conrad S. Hauser, codename DUKE, makes his debut in the Energon Universe in this issue ahead of his own title debuting next month.
- While G.I. Joe doesn’t exist yet in this continuity, it seems the U.S. military has been developing some hi-tech tools, such as the jetpack Duke uses. This could be a new take on Jet Mobile Propulsion Unit (J.U.M.P.) jetpack from the G.I. Joe toyline, which Duke famously used in the opening sequence of G.I. Joe: The Movie.
Real-world references
- Frosting’s name is painted on the side of his jet’s cockpit, a real practice common on United States fighter aircraft. It’s worth noting, however, that the formatting is slightly off. His rank and full name should be on one line, with his callsign printed below. Instead, it lists simply his rank, first name, and callsign on the same line.
Storytelling notes
- Apparently, DWJ at one point considered modelling Spike on photos of himself as a kid—but he quickly decided it felt weird.[1] For Spike's final design, DWJ wanted to give him big ears, and make him appear "racially ambiguous". His Marty McFly jacket wasn't particularly a reference, just an aesthetic preference of DWJ's.[2]
- On the first page, DWJ drew close-up panels of an American goldfinch and a coast rhododendron—the state bird and state flower of Washington.[3] Colorist Mike Spicer evidently was not told which specific species had been drawn, so they're just in random colors.
- The issue's opening scene, where Optimus Prime accidentally steps on a deer, was one that Hasbro got cold feet about. DWJ's editor suggested changing the animal for a squirrel, but DWJ was able to fight for the scene as he'd envisioned it. Following on from last issue, the scene draws further inspiration from The Iron Giant, in which the Iron Giant sees a deer get killed.[4]
- For the planet Cybertron, DWJ looked to The Transformers: The Movie for reference.[5]
- Beachcomber, seen getting shot in flashback, is one of DWJ's favorite Autobots.[6]
- Prime's trailer being established as the Autobots' makeshift base stemmed from a feeling that previous Transformers media had underutilised the trailer, or downplayed its significance relative to Prime himself.[7]
- Carly is seen adding Optimus Prime to her van's mural, following on from the previous issue, where she remarked that the painting was missing something. According to DWJ, this was primarily a mercenary bit of plotting to give Laserbeak a reason to follow her at the end of the issue[8]—from Laserbeak's POV, we can see him zooming in on the drawing of Prime, with his heads-up-display reading "!!".
- The police car seen this issue is drawn as Prowl as a way of deliberately playing with readers' expectations.[9]
- The Energon converter is another plot device, as DWJ needed a quick-and-dirty way of solving the Decepticons' fuel problem. After the fact, he realised they resembled the scream canisters from Monsters, Inc.![10]
- The Seeker who stomps on the cop was originally intended as Skywarp, not Starscream! After spotting the coloring error, DWJ decided it didn't actually matter, so it remains that way in the final issue.[11] In the previous panel, Starscream is standing on the other side of the Energon converter from the cop.
- Unsurprisingly, the confrontation between Duke and Starscream, which serves to set up Duke's own miniseries, was mandated by Skybound, but DWJ had a lot of freedom over the specifics.[12]
- DWJ came up with Frosting's callsign after seeing his wife's leftover cupcake frosting in the freezer![13]
- The F-18 is specifically drawn as the older model, as seen in Independence Day, instead of the revised F-18D.[14]
- DWJ improvised the design for Duke's high-tech jetpack, and at Robert Kirkman's prompting, came up with the story beat where he shoots Starscream with a flare gun.[15]
- Optimus Prime is drawn mid-transformation in remarkable detail. DWJ was never satisfied by on-panel depictions of transformation in the Marvel or IDW comics.[16]
Errors
- As mentioned above, the wildlife on the first page is miscolored; the Goldfinch is colored blue, while the pink rhododendron is skewed towards red.
- On page 4, 'millennia' is mis-spelled as 'millenia'.
- Amongst the deactivated Autobots in the quarry is Sideswipe who appears to be miscolored as Mirage, and a bot who appears to be either Inferno or Grapple (with their wheels on the side of their legs rather than their foot) in the colors of Prowl.
- On page 11, when Duke is alerting Frosting about an incoming bogey on their radar, his flight helmet is miscolored pink as if he were Frosting. Duke is sitting in the weapon systems officer's seat behind Frosting's pilot seat, therefore he would be the one to see Starscream on the radar screen, and not Frosting telling his passenger of an unidentified aircraft.
- On page 12, the round speech bubble is mistakenly pointed to Starscream instead of Frosting's F-18. If it were Starscream saying the line, then the speech bubble would be angular and boxy, plus Starscream was the one taking shots the previous panel, not Frosting.
Other trivia
Covers (19)
- Cover A: Starscream attacks Frosting, by Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer.
- Cover B: Optimus Prime transforms as he drives off a cliff, by Afu Chan.
- Cover C (1:10 Copy Incentive): Connecting cover by Orlando Arocena.
- Cover D (1:25 Copy Incentive): Autobots wage their battle to destroy the evil forces of the Decepticons, by Bryan Hitch & Alex Sinclair.
- Cover E (1:50 Copy Incentive): Duke uses his jetpack against Starscream, by Tom Reilly.
- Second Printing Cover A: Duke, by Jason Howard.
- Second Printing Cover B: Soundwave, by Jason Howard.
- Second Printing Cover C: Cliffjumper, by Jason Howard.
- Third Printing Cover: by Gerald Parel & Frédéric Pham Chuong.
- Fourth Printing Cover: by Nikola Čižmešija.
- Fifth Printing Cover: Starscream stands on a pile of corpses, by Stefano Simeone.
- Sixth Printing Cover: by Jon Lam.
- Seventh Printing Cover: by Eric Canete.
- Eighth Printing Cover: by Patricia Martín Samaniego.
- Transformers Battersea Seventh Printing Cover A: by Simon Parr. Limited to 2,024 copies.
- Transformers Battersea Seventh Printing Cover B: Black & White variant. Limited to 400 copies.
- Transformers Battersea Seventh Printing Cover A: Spot foil variant. Limited to 1,000 copies.
- Transformers Battersea Seventh Printing Cover B: Foil variant. Limited to 400 copies.
Advertisements
- Codename: G.I. Joe starts in Duke #1.
- A new era for G.I. Joe starts in G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero #301.
- Universal Monsters Dracula
Reprints
- Transformers Volume 1: Robots in Disguise (May 8, 2024) ISBN 1534398171 / ISBN 978-1534398177
- Collects Transformers issues #1–6.
- Trade paperback format.
- Variant covers:
- Blackbird Comics & Coffeehouse Exclusive: by Matthew Allison. Limited to 300 copies. ISBN 978-1534327818
- Comics Etc. Exclusive: by Stewart McKenny & John Law. Limited to 300 copies.
- Direct Market Exclusive: by Jonboy Meyers. Exclusively sold through the comic book direct market. ISBN 978-1534327726
- Gotham City Limit Exclusive: by Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer. Limited to 300 copies. ISBN 978-1534327771
- Jonathan Comics Exclusive: by Jason Howard. Limited to 300 copies.
- Things From Another World Exclusive: by Frédéric Pham Chuong. Limited to 400 copies. ISBN 978-1534327887
- TopShelfComic Fan Expo Dallas Exclusive: by Pasquale Ferrara. Limited to 300 copies.
- Transformers Deluxe Edition Book 1 (April 30, 2025) ISBN 1534328238 / ISBN 978-1534328235
- Collects Transformers issues #1–12.
- Hardcover format.
- Variant covers:
- Bookdelivery Exclusive: by Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer. Limited to 200 copies. ISBN 978-1534328679
- Direct Market Exclusive: by Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer. Exclusively sold through the comic book direct market. ISBN 978-1534329607
- Hasbro Pulse Exclusive: by Tom Whalen. ISBN 978-1534398414
- TopShelfComic Exclusive: by Marcelo Matere. Limited to 200 copies.
-
Volume 1: Robots in Disguise – cover art by Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer -
Volume 1: Robots in Disguise Blackbird Comics & Coffeehouse Exclusive – cover art by Matthew Allison -
Volume 1: Robots in Disguise Comics Etc. Exclusive – cover art by Stewart McKenny & John Law -
Volume 1: Robots in Disguise Direct Market Exclusive – cover art by Jonboy Meyers -
Volume 1: Robots in Disguise Gotham City Limit Exclusive – cover art by Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer -
Volume 1: Robots in Disguise Jonathan Comics Exclusive – cover art by Jason Howard -
Volume 1: Robots in Disguise Things From Another World Exclusive – cover art by Frédéric Pham Chuong -
Volume 1: Robots in Disguise TopShelfComic Fan Expo Dallas Exclusive – cover art by Pasquale Ferrara -
Deluxe Edition Book 1 – cover art by Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer -
Deluxe Edition Book 1 Bookdelivery Exclusive – cover art by Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer -
Deluxe Edition Book 1 Direct Market Exclusive – cover art by Daniel Warren Johnson & Mike Spicer -
Deluxe Edition Book 1 Hasbro Pulse Exclusive – cover art by Tom Whalen -
Deluxe Edition Book 1 TopShelfComic Exclusive – cover art by Marcelo Matere
External links
References
- ↑ "I did play with one design of Spike which kind of looked like me as a kid, but it just felt a little weird. So I was like, "I'm not going to do that." But I did think about it!"—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ ""How did I decide on drawing Spike?" How did I draw... I was trying to draw somebody- I really like drawing characters with like really large ears, 'cause I love drawing ears, so there was one excuse. And I wanted to try and make him look kind of like... racially ambiguous? So there was that. Other than that, you know, I was, with that kind of jacket- like the- people say like the Marty McFly jacket, I just really like drawing those kinds of jackets. I'm not necessarily trying to go for an 80s vibe, but it just felt right. So I was trying to just come up with something that felt natural, and that's kind of what you got there, was the design of Spike."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "This—I forget what bird this is, but it is the [state] bird of Washington. This is the state flower. [...] And this is just a toad that has no relevance to the state of Washington."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "Starting off with the [...] deer scene, which I wrote in the outline of the issue one outline to kind of give to everybody involved—Hasbro, Skybound—an idea of where I'm taking the story, and some of the beats. And this was initially totally fine, but, you know, I think maybe Hasbro read it a second time, and they were very nervous about Optimus stepping on a deer. So I definitely had to fight for this one. And to be fair to Hasbro, you know, I don't think they necessarily knew like the vibe that I was going to try and give this scene. In no way was I trying to do this for laughs, or to like... you know, be cheeky, or... in any way like disrespectful to the character of Optimus Prime. I honestly felt like this is the perfect 180 contrast to Starscream in issue one, squishing a dude. This just felt right. It felt like the perfect one-two of Starscream squishing and then Optimus accidentally hurting, not even a human but an innocent deer, and being completely wrecked. I've seen on Twitter, people are having a really hard time with the fact that Optimus Prime would accidentally step on a deer when a deer would run away... I don't know, what can I say, you know? A writer can't think of everything! So, yes, I remember one of my editors was like, "maybe he could step on a squirrel instead of a deer, to keep Hasbro happy?" and I was like, "Nope! Has to be a deer. Nobody feels the way they feel when they see a dead squirrel on the side of the road, versus a deer." This is also a subtle nod to one of my favorite films, The Iron Giant—it is a bit different, because Optimus is directly responsible for hurting the deer, whereas the Iron Giant in the movie just sees the deer get killed. And I didn't really... with The Iron Giant, it's very much that the robot in The Iron Giant is a little bit more of a baby, whereas Optimus Prime is of course way more like brainy, and able to process things in a more advanced way, that the Iron Giant was still just kind of grasping. So it is a different tone, but it is a little subtle homage to one of my favorite robot movies. So yeah, but anyway, so I definitely had to fight for this scene. And again, Hasbro I think had a right to be nervous, but I remember like writing, like in the conversation, about whether or not to do this scene, I was like, "Hey, I'm going to treat this with the utmost respect, and I think that this scene will be talked about as an Optimus Prime moment for a very long time to come, and I know I can pull it off." It's not like me stroking my back or whatever, inflating my own ego, I was just so confident, this scene screamed out to me as one of the absolute necessary scenes in the entire series. It just had to be in there. [...] I really did try and make this something to, you know, you could like ruminate over."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "You can see this is loosely modeled after the Cybertron that we see in the 1986 movie, surprise, surprise. You know, I didn't know how much I wanted to show of Cybertron [...] for story reasons, but I figured, you know, get a nice big shot. I used a dinner plate to draw this large sphere, and then just kind of riffed for the rest of it. And this is all screen tone [...] with a little bit of highlights, call these the Akira highlights, you know that video of the lady dotting the background of the Akira cells. So definitely doing that here."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "So we got one of my favorite Autobots here, Beachcomber, who is seemingly dying. Mmm, can't say more about that."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "I never thought that Optimus's trailer was used enough in all the fiction—TF fiction, TF stories—that I saw. I always love that trailer, it's like- this is like a direct shoutout to the toy, of like this little robot that we don't really see that often in the show, in the cartoon, in the movie, in the comics (at least in the Marvel Comics that I'm most familiar with). So just definitely wanted to show that- and this like tiny little race car, you know? All secondary stuff when it comes to the toy—I mean like, we're really here for Optimus—but since they kind of are escaping from the Ark, it was kind of important to me that they have a new base, with still some Cybertronian tech, that's why this is here."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "So here, I was trying to give Carly some personality, and also later on in the issue it's important storywise that Laserbeak finds Carly—otherwise, you know, the story has trouble progressing. And this matters an issue #3, which I will not give away. But Laserbeak somehow needed to follow Carly, and I was like racking my head, I was like, "Why would he follow Carly from the Ottawa base?" Like, what would give him a reason to follow this heavy metal van, where he would probably just like leave it and go look at something else. So I was like, "Well, what if Carly was like, an artist, and she painted on her heavy metal van a picture of Optimus Prime, which like, would obviously attract the attention of an evil Decepticon." So that was written in- this, right here, her working with the airbrush, was directly just so that I would have a fun way for Carly to be followed by a bad guy. And I drew the heck out of this airbrush—you know, I do love airbrushes—drawing Optimus here. It's a very subtle detail, but of course, it's important, you know?"—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "I know what you're all thinking: "Is this actually Prowl?" And... I have no comment, okay? Maybe it'll transform into Prowl in like issue #20, maybe it won't, okay? Who knows! I'm not going to pretend that this isn't the car that is Prowl, but that's all I can say about that, so... maybe I'm just swerving you, you know? You have no idea. This is what I really like about Transformers, I'm playing with your expectations. You have no idea truly what's coming."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "Talk about a McGuffin! Having to draw like this technological thing that can, like, harvest energy... You know, we're all doing our best here, you know? I'm writing genre fiction, I'm writing The Transformers, we got to find a way to get Energon, I got to figure out a way to make this work, I'm under a deadline, I'm writing a script, you got some great ideas, you got some whatever ideas... Here we've got this, like, Energon harvester, that just is like totally random! And I was like, "Yeah, this is in the Autobots' Ark, so." You know, don't want to give away the trade secrets too much, but what can I say, uh... This is like a bit of a way to get me out of trouble, 'cause I was like, "I'm not sure how they're going to get Energon. I guess I'll draw something that looks relatively cool." Definitely did not realize that these look like the scream canisters from Monsters, Inc.! You know, there is no origin originality anymore, I don't know. I'm doing my best here."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "This was meant to be Skywarp that was smooshing this cop, but Mike accidentally colored it Starscream, and I was like, "Eh, it actually doesn't matter!" So I didn't make him change it."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "I love this scene. You know, it was requested to me by Skybound that I include a... some sort of interaction between which we now—spoiler alert—know is Duke and Starscream."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "I had to come up- you know, when you're writing, you know these scenes like this, where it's like a character like Frosting that you know is not going to be around for that long... you're just kind of riffing, you know? And I was like, "Oh, what would be a cool call sign?" And I just was like, I saw, I was like looking in my freezer, and my wife makes a lot of cupcakes—thanks be to God—and so she makes so many cupcakes, she actually makes a bunch of frosting at a time, and she'll freeze what she doesn't use. And I saw that frosting in the freezer and I was like, "Frosting would be a great, great call sign." And thus we have Frosting."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "This is the F-18—let me see if I can remember... there's two, the F-18D—this is the old F-18 from Independence Day. The F-18D has a square exhaust opening, and I wanted to go old school. So... I am a nerd!"—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "This is fun, I had to come up with a jetpack design on the fly—I literally designed on the fly. And I remember Robert- so Robert was like, had kind of some oversight over this scene, and he said like, "Hey, it's really important that Duke seems cool, like he can handle himself in a fight. Even though he's like, just a regular pilot, he needs to like seem really badass." And so I was like, "Well, what if he like shot Starscream in the face with a flare gun? You know, and thinking on his feet." And I do like this a lot."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
- ↑ "Here we have Optimus transforming. And this is the first time I really tried to make it intentional, like... I don't know, like, I really wanted this to be cool, so I just drew the heck out of it. I gotta be honest, I was never a fan of either the- I was not a fan of like, in the Marvel Comics, when it would be like, either Optimus in robot form having just transformed, with a bunch of lines—just like random, like, you know, parallel lines against his body, implying that he just finished transforming—or the opposite where he's like a truck, and there's just a bunch of lines. And I was just like, "Ah... it just feels so... just feels like a missed opportunity!" Or in some of the, like, IDW comics, where it's like, they don't really draw transforming much at all. So I was like, "Well, it's a huge part of the vibe, I want to like... draw it!" And it's also really fun to get like, really out there with it, you know like? Just make things look weird in passing, and like an opportunity to show some really fun tech, that's a little messier than what the G1 designs are really known for."—Daniel Warren Johnson, YouTube, "TRANSFORMERS #2 DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY", 2023/11/29
