Cybertron No More
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| "Cybertron No More" | |||||||||||||
| Publisher | IDW Publishing | ||||||||||||
| First published | January 31, 2018 | ||||||||||||
| Cover date | January 2018 | ||||||||||||
| Written by | Magdalene Visaggio | ||||||||||||
| Art by | Fico Ossio | ||||||||||||
| Colors by | David García Cruz | ||||||||||||
| Letters by | Shawn Lee | ||||||||||||
| Editor | Sarah Gaydos and David Mariotte | ||||||||||||
| Continuity | IDW Generation 1 continuity | ||||||||||||
| Chronology | Current era | ||||||||||||
Leoric and the Spectral Knights try to stop Virulina and the Darkling Lords' plans to conquer Cybertron, but find themselves outnumbered when the villains turn the people of New Prysmos against them.
Synopsis
While Ironhide speeds out of New Prysmos to alert the rest of Cybertron to the threat the Visionaries now pose, Virulina and Cindarr take the deceased Kup's severed head and go to free Merklynn from his cell. Merklynn is already a step ahead of them; he has used his magic to kill his Cybertronian guards. As a horrified Leoric can do nothing but watch, Merklynn, Virulina, and Cindarr present Kup's head to the assembled populace of New Prysmos, revealing that Pyrsmosian magic can kill Cybertronians and declaring that they will take the whole of Cybertron for their own.
A little later, Leoric gathers the Spectral Knights at their fortress to discuss trying to stop Virulina and the Darkling Lords from going to full-scale war with Cybertron. Arzon is unsure; with so few Prysmosians even left alive, he is reluctant to initiate open conflict among their species, and considers the possibility Virulina may be right. The other Knights, however, stand with Leoric: Merklynn's plan to find a new home for the Prysmosians was never meant to involve an invasion, and Galadria, Ectar, and Witterquick refuse to abandon their brotherhood's long history of honor and justice to participate in the genocide of the Cybertronian species. Arzon is quickly won over to their way of thinking, and the Knights begin planning what to do next...
With crowds of Prysmosians watching and cheering, each of the three Darkling Lords, directed by Virulina, prepare to destroy the three pylons positioned around New Prysmos which generate the energy shield sealing the city off from the rest of Cybertron. Before they can, the Spectral Knights make their move: Witterquick bedevils Cravex with his super speed; Cindarr and Galadria hurl rhetoric at one another before resorting to physical combat in their magical animal totem forms; while Ectar takes out Lexor with just one punch. Unfortunately, the Spectral Knights are soon to find that the populace is not on their side, as the watching civilians intercede, defending the Darkling Lords, forcing the would-be heroes to fall back.
From a tower balcony, Merklynn and Virulina watch the explosions as the pylons are destroyed. Virulina is confident that her victory is all but accomplished—but Leoric has something to say about that, appearing behind them, weapons in hand. He and Virulina adopt their animal totem forms—he a lion, she a shark—and grapple, but Virulina's powerful jaws overcome Leoric and, wounded, he reverts to human form. Still, he is willing to fight on, but when he lunges for Merklynn, the wizard strikes him with a single mystically-powered blow that brings the fight to a definitive end.
Ironhide brings news of Kup's death to Wheeljack, but Wheeljack has some bad news of his own to share: he has verified that Transformers are especially vulnerable to the Visionaries' magic, and that with only two days until the Talisman burrows its way to Cybertron's core, he does not have enough time to come up with countermeasures. It looks like the Cybertronian race is doomed... until Leoric and the Spectral Knights arrive! Ironhide immediately orders the Knights arrested, but Leoric explains that they have come to help, and proposes an alliance between them in order to save both the Transformers' planet and the Knights' honor. Ironhide is reluctant, with given that the Visionaries can get close to the Talisman while the Transformers cannot, he begrudgingly agrees to join forces with the Knights.
Back in New Prysmos, Virulina is crowned chancellor of the city. Before its people, she vows to destroy every Transfomer on the planet!
Featured characters
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| Autobots | Decepticons | Spectral Knights | Darkling Lords | Others |
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Quotes
"You know what the downside of superspeed is?"
"Literally nothing?"
"You're always getting ahead of yourself."
- —Cravex and Witterquick
Notes
Visionaries references
- In this issue, the Visionaries reveal their classic ability to transform into their individual magical "totems," each one a glowing, solid-color magical animal. The process is a bit different, though. In classic Visionaries media, the knights wore their totems as chestplates, from which the animals were projected, while here, they use their power staffs to accomplish the effect. In classic media, the staffs were held by only a select number of the Visionaries, and were the source of additional magic separate from the totems, containing magical creatures they could summon to do their bidding. Oddly, the comic has them still wearing the totem chestplates anyway, in addition to the staffs (which are collapsible, and worn on their backs). The Spectral Knights totems are blue, as in the original series, but the Darkling Lords' are here changed from their original green to purple.
- Like Virulina last issue, most of the other Visionaries are shown wielding their unique, individualized weapons from the original series. While Cindarr's mace and Cravex's axe remain purely physical weapons, Galdria's spear, Ectar's blades, Lexor's hooks, and Leoric's whip are upgraded to become glowing magical-energy weapons, like Virulina's staff.
Errors
- Okay, we're not going to keep harping on about the fact this series was clearly written without proper knowledge of exactly what First Strike was meant to be setting up for it, but we will point out that the need for the Pyrsmosians to "destroy" the energy shield confirms lat issue's implication that it's being erroneously depicted as a Cybertronian creation to keep the Pyrsmosians in, when First Strike depicted it as being created by Merklynn to keep Cybertronians out.
Other trivia
- Backmatter for this issue is a four-page "The Art of the Process" featurette, showing how the first four pages of the issue go from script, to layouts, to inks, to color.
Covers (3)
- Cover A: The Transformers loom over New Prysmos, by Fico Ossio
- Cover B: Retro-style Visionaries, by Philip Murphy
- Retailer incentive cover: Virulina and Ironhide, by Brendan Cahill and Lauren Bennett
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