The Bridge to Nowhere!

	; "May I axe you a question?"
	"The Bridge to Nowhere!"
Publisher	Marvel Comics
First published	March 1986
Cover date	July 1986
Writer	Bob Budiansky
Penciler	Don Perlin
Inkers	Keith Williams & Vince Colletta
Colorist	Nel Yomtov
Letterer	Janice Chiang
Editor	Michael Carlin
Continuity	Marvel Comics continuity

While the Cybertronian Decepticons build a device that will allow travel between Cybertron and Earth, the Autobots make a desperate attempt to stop them.

Synopsis

A young couple is out for a drive through the Columbia River Gorge, when they discover a huge bridge. They further find that the bridge only goes half-way across, and has strange giant metal creatures that appear and promptly explode. They flee just as the bridge itself vanishes into thin air.

On Cybertron, Straxus is furious: the space bridge is returning from Earth, unprompted. He's somewhat less concerned about the fact that one of his own troopers just blew up, and sends another hapless soldier to investigate, with similarly explosive results. Before any more troops can be sacrificed, Shrapnel contacts Spanner, a kidnapped neutral scientist who designed the bridge, and identifies the fatal flaw. A watching Blaster, sent to hunt for Spanner, notes the info with interest. The space bridge is shut down pending repairs.

At a coal mine on Earth, Donny Finkleberg is still making broadcasts in his "Robot-Master" role, trying to convince humans that the Autobots are hostile. He complains about his working conditions, as all Ravage brings him for food is a snack machine full of candy. Megatron is barely tolerant of this. Shockwave arrives just then; He and Megatron argue about who leads the Decepticons until they receive a message from Straxus, declaring that he is about to open the space bridge. Given this development, the two leaders agree to a truce. Finkleberg decides he needs to find a way to warn the Autobots.

Blaster and Powerglide return to Autobase; Blaster reports on the operational space bridge. Unable to spare further time hunting for Spanner, Perceptor orders his band of Autobots into a full-scale assault on Darkmount as a diversion. With the Decepticons occupied, Blaster attempts to sabotage the bridge, but hesitates to detonate the explosives when he discovers that Spanner has actually been reconfigured into the space bridge itself! In pain, Spanner pleads with him to destroy his mutilated form. Before Blaster can make a decision, the Decepticons discover him and attack, taking the decision out of his hands.

Straxus orders the bridge to be activated, and the two sides battle between Earth and Cybertron. Blaster uses his earlier knowledge of the bridge's systems to destabilize it, and boots Straxus over the edge, destroying him. Blaster and his Autobot teammates flee to the other side of the space bridge to arrive on Earth, but the unstable bridge disappears behind them, and they are trapped on a strange new world.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots	Decepticons	Humans	Others
Blaster (9) Powerglide (10) Perceptor (11) Cosmos (12) Seaspray (13) Warpath (14) Beachcomber (15) Corkscrew (26) Borebit (27)	Crosscut (3) Straxus (4) Crosscut's successor (5) Shrapnel (6) Bombshell (7) Kickback (8) Ravage (16) Soundwave (18) Megatron (19) Shockwave (20) Starscream (21) Thundercracker (22) Skywarp (23) Laserbeak (24) Buzzsaw (25)	Rita (1) Charlie (2) Donny Finkleberg (17)	Spanner (28)

Quotes

"Spare me the details, Shrapnel - just do it!"

-Straxus spouts his favorite catchphrase

"Fleshling, you try my patience... turn off your vocal apparatus or I will turn it off for you -- permanently!"

-As Soundwave tried to explain, Megatron's circuitry has no tolerance for dissent.

"Those responsible for this will pay -- with their lives! And I will collect the fee... personally!"

- while tumbling off the collapsing Darkmount and transforming, Straxus still finds time for a witty one-liner.

"War is careless... in the victims it chooses... it is... too late... for me. ...Doing nothing... allowing me to live... another moment... in this obscene form... is the worst thing... you can do to me! Please... grant me this one last favor... kill me!"

- Spanner, who does not get his wish.

Notes

Artwork and technical errors

Straxus's colors change extensively in comparison to the previous issue.
Like last issue, Blaster is drawn with his cartoon head on the cover, but with his comic book head throughout the issue.
Earth is drawn with a giant ring of smoke around it. Maybe Unicron was about to come eat it with his pink mist?
Megatron's fusion cannon is missing its upper segment as Finkleberg acosts him.

Continuity errors

Back in issue #10, a hugely elaborate satellite array was required to send a signal to Cybertron. From this point on, however, communications between the two planets will be quite routine.

Continuity notes

We get confirmation of Cybertron's two moons. They previously were shown in issue but not remarked upon.
When Shockwave appears with Laserbeak and Buzzsaw to confront Megatron, Megatron comments that he had sent the two condors to retrieve the Seekers, not Shockwave. This is new information, most likely an attempt to explain an earlier continuity hiccup: Laserbeak and Buzzsaw (along with Soundwave and Ravage) had rescued Megatron from his immobility in issue #15 of the US series, but in #16 (written by a different author), the two bird-cassettes were working for Shockwave. This issue's revelation that they had been sent out on a mission provides an explanation: They had succeeded in finding the Seekers, but since the Seekers were serving under Shockwave at the time, the condors simply fell into his band.
Donny Finkleberg was captured by the Decepticons in "I, Robot-Master!".
"Dozens" of Transformers are killed in the space bridge battle; the only known Autobot survivors are the seven toy-based characters.

Real-life references

Megatron rather hilariously assesses sugar as "the substance humans require for fuel".
The space bridge test happens in the Columbia River Gorge of northern Oregon; we also stop in at the Decepticons' eastern Wyoming coal mine base in the Powder River Basin.

UK printing

The UK comic inserted an additional seven issues between US #16 and #17, wherein Soundwave and the cassettes served under Shockwave but manipulated events to bring him together with Megatron to resolve the Decepticon leadership issue. The dialogue in this story was edited in the UK reprint to reflect this.

Issue #68:

Backup strips: Rocket Raccoon and Robo-Capers
Fact File Interface: Long Haul

Issue #69:

Backup strips: Rocket Raccoon and Robo-Capers
Fact File Interface: Swoop

Other trivia

The full title of the previous issue was given as "Return to Cybertron Part 1: The Smelting Pool!". Ostensibly, this would make "The Bridge To Nowhere!", "Return to Cybertron Part 2", although it is not explicitly named as such.
This issue introduces the concept of the space bridge, and it is radically different to how it appears in the cartoon.
This issue was reprinted in the Titan Books collection Transformers: Cybertron Redux.
This issue was reprinted as issue #6 of IDW Publishing's Generations series.
The Letters to the Editors section of the Marvel US publication of this issue includes the first mention of Shingo.

Bot Roster

Autobots: 17 active, 7 new arrivals from Cybertron, and 12 in repair bay.
Decepticons: 17 active.

Changes in the IDW Transformers Classics reprint

Soundwave is corrected to blue in his appearances on pages 8, 9 and 10 -- but is in his original purple colouration on page 11.
Hope you don't like the Spacebridge landscape in the background of this issue's cover, because the reprint omits it completely. Blaster is also rendered in a strikingly darker red than normal, even for these reprints.
On page 7, panel 1 Powerglide's face is 'corrected' to white from its original grey.
On page 10, panels 5 and 6 Straxus's holographic transmission is now grey instead of red.
On page 20, the white sections of Straxus's limbs are colored pink. Good for you Straxus, you got yet ANOTHER color scheme.

Covers (13)

US issue #18 - "Maybe we should start seeing other people?"
UK issue #68 - A really bad space soap opera.
UK issue #69 - The US cover on acid.

US cover: Blaster vs. Straxus, by Herb Trimpe.
UK issue #68 cover: A half Earth/half Cybertron with the respective leaders of each, by Phil Gascoine.
UK issue #69 cover: reuse of art from US cover with a new background.

The Transformers Comics Magazine issue #9
Transformers Comic-Magazin issue #6: The world on acid.
Cybertron Redux TPB
Cybertron Redux HC

The Transformers Comics Magazine issue #9 cover: recolored version of the cover to US issue #17.
Transformers Comic-Magazin issue #6 cover: a golden Megatron attacking Optimus Prime (again, this is supposed to represent US #18 somehow).
Cybertron Redux TPB cover: Blaster, Ramhorn, Bombshell, Shrapnel, Kickback and half of the space bridge, by Andrew Wildman.
Cybertron Redux hardback cover: Blaster in the smelting pool, by Don Figueroa, Gary Erskine & Chris Blythe.