The Plotters' Club (Part 2): Filling in the Blanks

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« The Transformers:
Lost Light #11 		»
"The Plotters' Club (Part 2):
Filling in the Blanks"
Publisher IDW Publishing
First published November 29, 2017
Cover date October 2017
Written by James Roberts
Art by Jack Lawrence
Colors by Joana Lafuente
Letters by Tom B. Long
Editor Carlos Guzman
Continuity IDW continuity
Chronology Current era

Or: How Getaway Did It.

Synopsis

Not so very long ago, aboard the Lost Light, Getaway reclines on a couch in Rung's quarters and tells Froid the story of how he took over the ship...

Over the course of months, one by one, Getaway and co-conspirator Atomizer speak to every member of the Lost Light crew, either securing their aid in a potential future mutiny against Rodimus and Megatron, or wiping their memories with Getaway's nudge gun if they refuse. Most of the crew sides with them outright, with around two-dozen "undecided" voters. After winning over Mainframe, the pair hold their final "interview" with Thunderclash—an Autobot who Getaway clearly hates, but who, surprisingly, is totally onboard with the idea of getting rid of Megatron.

Getaway's plot falters when he is incarcerated for manipulating Tailgate in an attempt to get Megatron to incriminate himself, but when Mainframe picks up a signal from Necroworld, he sees the opening Getaway has told him to watch out for, and quickly arranges for Megatron, Rodimus, and their "inner circle" to be stranded on the planet when they leave the ship to investigate. Soon after the mutineers free Getaway, Rodimus's team makes contact with the ship, whereupon Getaway gloats over his victory—but it transpires that most of the rest of the crew were unaware of his plan to hand Megatron over to the Galactic Council, having only ever thought that the plan was to get him off the ship. After terminating Rodimus's call, Getaway reassures the crew that he has made sure the other Autobots' lives are in no danger... but that is another lie, as the Council agreed to no such terms, and Getaway's attempts to make contact with the Council to amend their agreement are refused, leading to a temper tantrum from the escapologist that ends with a chair being put through a viewscreen.

Needing to get the crew back on his side with a "clean win," Getaway puts Perceptor to work decrypting a collection of confusing information Getaway amassed while he was being held prisoner by Tyrest on Luna 1. Perceptor succeeds, locating what Tyrest called "the Warren"—a knot of quantum tunnels through which Tyrest intended to take Luna 1 to Cyberutopia, but which he had never been able to find. Getaway calls the crew together to tell them about this discovery, and, by comparing it to the map Rodimus scratched into his desk, concludes they can find Cyberutopia within weeks. This is the first time Thunderclash has seen Rodimus's map, which looks different to the one he saw in his own dreams; spotting some unfinished scratches around Cyberutopia's location, he uses his own first-hand knowledge to finish sketching them in, revealing that they are the symbols of the five clans of the Knights of Cybertron. As everyone ponders what this might mean, Blaster picks up a distress call; Getaway momentarily panics, until it turns out it is an SOS from the alien world of Frayus, requesting help evacuating to escape a battle between the Galactic Council and the Black Block Consortia. The crew is stunned when Getaway refuses them aid, dubbing the mercy mission a "distraction" from their real end goal. Various crewmembers start to object, but are interrupted by the transmission that Getaway was dreading: a call from Rodimus himself. In fact, it is the "last will and testament" made by those stranded on Necroworld, but only Rodimus's portion has time to play—containing the fact that the castaways are about to die at the hands of the Decepticon Justice Division—before Getaway cuts it off and deletes it, claiming it is a fake. Getaway orders everyone out of the room save for Atomizer and Thunderclash; the latter is determined to go to the rescue of Rodimus and the others, but before he can storm off to gather up volunteers for the mission, Atomizer shoots him in the throat, and Getaway discharges the nudge gun into his head multiple times. The grisly scene is witnessed by an eavesdropping Riptide, who tries to run, but is soon on the receiving end of a nudge gun blast of his own.

...and that, it turns out, is where Froid came in. Getaway orders Atomizer to release the psychotherapist and his pet serial killer Sunder from the ship's brig, and after he finishes telling Froid the story of how things got to this point, he proposes a trade. In return for using his remote mnemosurgery abilities to trap Thunderclash in a memory loop, and to alter the memories of the crew so they forget the transmission from Rodimus and believe he and the others left the ship of their own volition, Sunder demands the life cords of twenty-five victims for him to feast upon. Atomizer has pronounced doubts; he can tell this is no longer about getting rid of Megatron, but has become about Getaway's own monomaniacal, narcissistic need to fulfill what he considers his "destiny" of becoming a Prime at any and all costs. Even so, Getaway finds Sunder's price hard to swallow, but Froid—fascinated by Getaway's grotesque combination of psychological complexes and eager to study him in action—goads him on, inspiring Getaway to sacrifice the "undecided" voters to Sunder and have the crew's memory of them erased.

Getaway's heinous scheme is completed, but almost unravels when the Protectobots return to the ship and are told the truth by Riptide, who turns out to have been unaffected by the nudge gun due to Getaway running out its charge blasting Thunderclash. While the Protectobots are hunted down trying to escape by a security team who have been mnemosurgically convinced they are undercover Decepticons, Getaway and Atomizer take Riptide to the ship's oil reservoir, which Getaway reveals he has filled with scraplets. It is to these metal-eating monsters that Getaway has been feeding Sunder's "sacrifices," stripping them down to only their life cords... and to pay Sunder to place the Protectobots in memory loops of their own, he needs another one. With a final blast of the nudge gun, Getaway wipes Riptide's memory of how to transform into his boat mode, and shoves him into the reservoir...

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots Decepticons Others

Quotes

"So... Mainframe's a yes."
"Course he is. He's lonely—and the loneliest are the easiest."

—Atomizer and Getaway


"If we can win him over, we're laughing. Half the crew worship him. People have to sit down after talking to him."
"He's not that impressive."
"He carried the Matrix..."
"Temporarily! And he never displayed The Signs, did he? There's a world of difference between storing the Matrix and carrying it. He stored it. He was a glorified trophy cabinet."

—Atomizer and Getaway discuss Thunderclash


"Tailgate. That was my first misstep..."
"I'd like to talk about that. Has anyone ever used the word 'predatory' to describe your behavior?"
"Only as a compliment."

—Getaway and Froid


"So here's the thing about lying... the more you do it, the easier it gets."

—Getaway


"After I die, I want someone to sell my innermost energon—it's Matrix-enriched, so, y'know, it'll fetch a good price—and use the proceeds to employ a bounty hunter. There's this freelance peacekeeping agent on Elpasos. Horns, detachable hand, eyebrows that would make Rung jealous. Use him. I want what's left of my body turned into a pathblaster—Brainstorm says it's totally possible—and I want the bounty hunter to use the pathblaster to shoot Getaway in the face. Now ideally, the pathblaster would be in my colors? But the main thing is that Getaway dies knowing I was personally responsible for his lack of a head."

—Rodimus delivers his last wishes


"I need to trick them into trusting me again."

—Getaway in a nutshell


"[Getaway] makes for a fascinating case study. Narcissism, impostor syndrome, a truly multi-faceted inferiority complex... it's quite the cocktail."

—Froid


"D'you know why Team Megatron lost interest in you? D'you know why they didn't take you to Necroworld? Clue: it's because you're not like them. Brainstorm, Ratchet, Nightbeat, Skids. They're smart guys, Riptide. And you... you're really not."
"I'm not a psychiatrist either but I'm pretty sure this conversation says more about you than me."

—Getaway and Riptide

Notes

Continuity notes

  • Froid and Sunder were last seen in More than Meets the Eye #49.
  • Two "undecided" voters are named by Atomizer, both "comic-original" characters: Fervor, who first appeared in More than Meets the Eye #48, and Turbine, whose only appearance came in issue #6.
  • Just before his meeting with Thunderclash, Getaway says he is going to the oil reservoir with Tailgate; the pair were shown to go fishing there in More than Meets the Eye #40, but that can't be this time, because the presence of Thunderclash on the ship dates this scene to after issue #42 (but see "Errors," below).
  • Thunderclash was previously stated to have held the Matrix in More than Meets the Eye #21. Getaway is most put out about this, pointing out that Thunderclash never displayed "the Signs"; he is referring to the "Signs of Affinity" that means one is suited to be an actual-factual Matrix bearer. Why is Getaway so annoyed? Well, as we oh-so-casually learned in More than Meets the Eye #31, Getaway himself purportedly showed the Signs, which goes a long way to explaining the warped sense of self-entitled "destiny" that this issue reveals has been his main motivator all along.
  • Getaway flashes back to the events of More than Meets the Eye 47, in which he tried to have Tailgate killed by Megatron. We see Ultra Magnus arresting him, an off-panel scene not shown before that takes place between issues #47 and #48.
  • Pages 6-7 are reprinted in their entirety from More than Meets the Eye #50, featuring the artwork of Alex Milne and Priscilla Tramontano, with surrounding pages showing the other side of the same scene back on the Lost Light that we didn't see in the original issue. General Neech of the Galactic Council, who appeared in that issue, is name-dropped here.
  • Getaway refers back to his time as a prisoner of Tyrest, and the deranged Chief Justice's attempts to create a portal to Cyberutopia, which, as a footnote reminds us, were chronicled in More than Meets the Eye #17-21. "The Warren" was namedropped just last issue; the idea that Tyrest wanted to fly the entire moon of Luna 1 through it hearkens back to the revelation that the moon had massive planetary engines, as revealed at the end of issue #21.
  • Hound recalls the class Megatron held on the Knights of Cybertron, and the conclusion they all reached that the Knights sub-divided into different clans, each represented by a different symbol, which all took place in More than Meets the Eye #50. We learned that there were five clans total in Lost Light #8, but only the infamous gear-symbol that has been appearing throughout the adventures of the Lost Light was known to the class at the time; Thunderclash noted that he had seen other symbols but been unable to focus on them, suggesting that his successful completion of the images in this issue is the first time he has done this.
  • The scraplets Getaway has filled the reservoir with are specifically identified as partially-domesticated "Red Scraplets" he found in the medibay. Though you may immediately assume these are the same scraplets that caused trouble for the crew in the 2015 Transformers Holiday Special, which were quite intelligent and last seen in the medibay, those scraplets weren't red; this is, in fact, a different cluster of scraplets that were alluded to be on the ship from the beginning of its voyage, which appeared in a single panel in More than Meets the Eye #16, and were indeed red in color. Moreover, issue #33 noted that the Lost Light's quantum duplicate had "domesticated scraplets" aboard, which must surely be the same critters.
  • Did you spot the implication that something menacing was lurking in the oil reservoir last issue? When Getaway had his conversation with First Aid about whether or not he could trust him, it was held outside the oil reservoir, and Getaway had his hand on the controls, aaalll ready to open the door and shove First Aid in if trust wasn't forthcoming...

Transformers references

  • The "freelance peacekeeping agent" Rodimus describes in his last wishes (quoted above) is, of course, Death's Head, the bounty hunter created for the Marvel UK Generation 1 comic, who has previously been alluded to in IDW continuity by Impactor's bio in Last Stand of the Wreckers #5. Rodimus notes Death Head hangs out on the planet Elpasos; that's where Death's Head was visiting during his first appearance in Marvel UK issue #113—famously, Roberts's first issue of the comic, and one he has made numerous references to during his tenure.
  • Rodimus also requests that his dead body be converted into a Pathblaster that Death's Head should use to kill Getaway; the Pathblaster is another Marvel UK reference, a devastatingly powerful weapon featured in issue #203. Rodimus's intention to have it blow off Getaway's head, specifically, may reference how its sole use in that issue removed part of Galvatron's.
  • The scraplet is drawn based on the creatures' appearance in the Transformers: Prime animated series. But red.

Real-life references

  • Various pieces of dialogue in this issue include allusions to the talking points of ascendant right-wing politicians uttered across 2016-2017:
    • "The will of the people has been realized—all without a single shot being fired!" says Getaway after stranding Team Rodimus. The outcome of 2016's Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom has often been referred to with the buzz-phrase "the will of the people." Brexit proponent Nigel Farage remarked following the win that "revolution" had been victorious "without a single bullet being fired." A statement that understandably angered a lot of people, as the campaign had seen the public murder of Jo Cox, an anti-Brexit Member of Parliament, by a man shouting pro-fascist statements as he SHOT her.
    • Getaway calls Rodimus's transmission "fake news," a term referring to misinformation and propaganda, but most famously used by Donald Trump to simply attack negative news reports about him in the same incendiary manner Getaway employs it here.
    • Froid goads Getaway by saying he is securing "a strong and stable future for our race"; "strong and stable" was the election slogan of British Prime Minister Theresa May in 2017, which was repeated so regularly and robotically that it became the subject of mockery in the press.
  • Getaway calls Riptide "Boaty McBoatface", a name that entered the meme-o-sphere in 2016 when it won an online poll to decide what a new UK Antarctic research vessel would be called.
  • He also calls him "the little boat that couldn't," a reference to The Little Engine That Could.
  • Getaway refers to turning Tailgate into a "red rag." That's an allusion to the rather British euphemism, "like a red rag to a bull," referring to an act of deliberate provocation—like trying to provoke Megatron into murdering Tailgate.

Errors

  • Getaway's meeting with Thunderclash is technically impossible. The former captain of the Vis Vitalis was comatose from the time he was brought on-board the Lost Light in More than Meets the Eye #42 until waking up in issue #48, after Getaway had already pulled his stunt with Tailgate and Megatron, meaning that there is no point in time at which the meeting seen in this issue could have occurred. When this was pointed out to Roberts on Twitter, he admitted his mistake, and promised a "continuity patch" in a later issue that will indicate Thunderclash had woken from his coma and had a relapse somewhere between the two issues.[1]

Other trivia

  • Originally solicited for release in October, this issue arrives noticeably late, in the final week of November.
  • The re-used pages from More than Meets the Eye #50 are included in addition to the regular 20 story pages, making this story 22 pages in length.

Soundtrack

Covers (4)

  • Cover A: Getaway admires a "Getaway Star," by Jack Lawrence and Joana Lafuente
  • Cover B: Getaway seizes the Lost Light, by Nick Roche and Josh Burcham, revisiting the theme of Roche and Burcham's covers for issues #1-5
  • Cover C: Getaway aiming his nudge gun, reflected in First Aid's visor, by Alex Milne and Josh Perez
  • Retailer incentive cover: Megatron leads the Decepticons in attacking Optimus Prime, Bumblebee, and Windblade, with everyone in their Evergreen character designs, by Joana Lafuente; part of a matching pair with Lafuente's retailer incentive cover for Optimus Prime #12, which shows the scene from the opposite angle

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References

  1. ↑ James Roberts on Twitter
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