Crisis of Command!

This article is about the comic issue. For the mobile game event, see Crisis of Command (Earth Wars).

« The Transformers (UK) #42–44 »
Bumblebee criticizes the size of the Decepticon's weapons!
"Crisis of Command!"
Publisher	Marvel Comics
First published	Part 1: 28th December, 1985 Part 2: 4th January, 1986 Part 3: 11th January, 1986
Cover date	Part 1: 4th January Part 2: 11th January Part 3: 18th January, 1986
Writer	Mike Collins (Part 1 & 3), James Hill (Part 2)
Art	Geoff Senior (Parts 1-2), John Stokes (Part 3)
Colour	Steve Whitaker (Part 1), John Burns and Stuart Place (Part 2), Gina Hart and Stuart Place (Part 3)
Letters	Mike Scott
Editor	Ian Rimmer
Continuity	Marvel Comics continuity (Marvel UK)
Chronology	1986

Optimus Prime struggles to maintain discipline when a group of Autobots want to use the Matrix to build an army of super warriors. Then Bumblebee is captured by the Decepticons.

Contents 1 Synopsis 1.1 Part 1 1.2 Part 2: "Bumblebee Alone!" 1.3 Part 3: "Primed for Action!" 2 Featured characters 3 Quotes 4 Notes 4.1 Production notes 4.2 Continuity notes 4.3 Transformers references 4.4 Continuity and plotting errors 4.5 Artwork and technical errors 4.6 Other Trivia 4.7 Back-up material 4.8 Covers (3) 4.9 Reprints 5 References

Synopsis

Part 1

A group of Autobots led by Prowl petition Optimus Prime to use the recently-reclaimed Creation Matrix to create an army of super warriors to defeat the Decepticons. Other Autobots, fronted by Jazz, disagree, and the argument becomes heated. Prime refuses to pervert the Matrix in such a manner, fearing what will become of the Earth if such warriors are unleashed upon it, but the Autobots' discontent with his ruling is evident. This only fuels the feelings of self-doubt that Prime has been dealing with, brought on by the Autobots' recent string of defeats by Shockwave, and he worries that he may no longer be fit to command.

Prime is unaware that his maudlin musings are being observed by Ravage, who has infiltrated the Ark to learn the Autobots plans following their re-acquisition of the Matrix. He deliberately trips the Ark's alarms, alerting the Autobots to his presence, and after a short battle, he is deceived by Mirage's illusions and captured in an energy net by Hound. But Ravage's capture is all part of the Decepticons' scheme; Laserbeak observes the whole scene and reports to acting commander Soundwave that things are going according to plan. Then, as night falls, Ravage escapes with ease, using his electromagnetic emission shield to simply walk through his cell's energy bars...

Part 2: "Bumblebee Alone!"

Bumblebee discovers that Ravage has escaped and reports the matter to Optimus Prime. An already-low Prime is shaken even more by this revelation, and Prowl is quick to capitalize on his leader's state of mind, continuing to push for the creation of new warriors. Dismayed to see how low Prime has sunk, Bumblebee disobeys his leader's order to inform Hound and Mirage of Ravage's escape, and decides to try and recapture the Decepticon spy by himself. Unfortunately, Bumblebee does not realize that luring unsuspecting Autobots such as himself into an ambush was the very reason Ravage allowed himself to be captured in the first place, and when he follows the fleeing feline into a box canyon, he finds himself confronted by Soundwave and the other Decepticons. Bumblebee attempts to escape, but is quickly subdued and captured, and his severed arm is dropped in front of the Ark by Laserbeak as an invitation to Optimus Prime to come and recover the rest of him.

Part 3: "Primed for Action!"

As the Autobots react in horror to the sight of Bumblebee's severed limb, the hovering Laserbeak warns Optimus to come for Bumblebee alone. All indecision forgotten, Prime heads for the Decepticon fortress, but upon approach, is caught up in an earthquake generated by Rumble. Optimus dispatches the little punk, but is then ambushed by Thundercracker and Skywarp. It seems the Autobot leader has fallen, but just as Starscream is closing in for the final blow—boasting about how he is a true leader of 'bots, unlike the "defeated" Prime—Optimus springs back to life and takes down all three of them with his bare hands, proving how empty Starscream's words truly are. Finally, Prime storms the fortress, defeats Soundwave and Laserbeak, and rescues Bumblebee.

After returning to the Ark, Prime addresses the Autobots on the issue of super-warriors once more. Crediting Starscream's show of false bravado with proving to him how a real leader should act, Prime formally declares that for the sake of the Earth, no such new warriors will be created—and the Autobots, moved by their commander's renewed passion and determination, accept his ruling without question.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Quotes

"That is why Megatron, and Shockwave after him, were leaders, and you will never be anything more than battle fodder! You have no strategy, no subtlty. You are a missile with a mouth, Starscream!"

—Soundwave

"[Optimus Prime]'s just waiting to be put out of his misery... waiting for the final blow from Starscream—the leader killer!"
<Optimus beats the tar out of everyone else in a matter of seconds>
"Now, leader killer. We are alone. No lackeys to order or hide behind. Just you... just me... so kill me!"

—Starscream's bluff is called by Optimus Prime, a second before Prime punches him so hard his wings fly off

Notes

Production notes

• In their interview in The Transformers Classics UK Volume 1, writers Mike Collins and James Hill explained the story of "Crisis of Command!" was partially conceived as part of a planned new marketing campaign for the comic. Certain scenes were designed to "mirror" ones from the Generation 1 cartoon, so that television adverts for the comic could show the cartoon clips and have them "morph" into the comic panels. These ads did not come to pass, as it was concluded that they contravened broadcast standards.
• In the same interview, they said Prowl got the job of being the heavy because he turned into a police car; specifically, they were inspired by the character of Lt. Hunter from Hill Street Blues. The proposed arms race was inspired by bellicose rhetoric from Reagan and Thatcher at the time.
• Parts 1 and 2 of "Crisis of Command!" are the first published Transformers work by artist Geoff Senior, who would go on to become one of the most celebrated artists on the UK title, and eventually move over to drawing the US series. Senior's two parts are also the closest the first-year UK stories come to clearly and properly drawing all the Transformers based on their finished character models (while the third part, drawn by John Stokes, defaults to the character model/box art/toy mash-up designs previously used by the artist in "Decepticon Dam-Busters!"). As such, without past artistic ambiguities to cloud the matter, "Crisis of Command!" is the first story to clearly establish that the UK comic will be consistently ignoring some US coloring choices going forward and setting its own rules: namely, it will always colour Soundwave in his correct, toy-accurate blue (instead of the US comic's purple), and Hound's legs in cartoon-based white and green (as opposed to the solid blue used by the US comic, seen in the comparison at right).

Continuity notes

• The insecurities that plague Optimus Prime in this story—the product of his and the Autobots' recent string of defeats at the hands of Shockwave in US issue #4-12, to which he flashes back—were first hinted at in the previous issue. This story was intended to show Prime getting 'back in the saddle' after all of those events, through the medium of having a badass Die Hard inspired fight.^[1]
• Soundwave serves as acting commander of the Decepticons (right) following Shockwave's defeat at the hands of Optimus Prime in US issue #12, which saw him hurled into a swamp. Soundwave will retain this position for the subsequent run of UK stories, all set before Shockwave's return in US issue #14.
• The Decepticons have relocated to base this operation out of their old fortress base, constructed in US issue #2 and abandoned in US issue #5. Oddly, Page 4 of Part 3 appears to give this base the name of "Fortress Sinister"—a name that is never used again, making one wonder if it was a mistake (as in, if the text "THE DECEPTICONS' FORTRESS SINISTER!" was meant to be the more descriptive "THE DECEPTICONS' SINISTER FORTRESS!"). Regardless, it is objectively an awesome-sounding name!
• While their last known status in US stories permits Soundwave and his cassettes to have relocated to the old fortress by the time of his story, the presence of Starscream, Skywarp, and Thundercracker is not a smooth fit with the upcoming US issue #14, which will present the three jets as having been trapped on the captured Blackrock oil-drilling platform since US issue #6. However, this itself seems to ignore Starscream having been shown on the mainland with the main Decepticon army in US issue #9, so it would appear there was some travel back and forth.
• Though US writer Bob Budiansky had stopped writing Laserbeak and Ravage as possessing the power of speech by this point in the series, this story continues to present both as capable of talking. UK stories will eventually fall into line with Laserbeak, but Ravage will be a consistent talker.
• While facing the Decepticon jets, Optimus Prime remembers back to Xaaron appointing him supreme Autobot leader and telling him "the fate of the Autobots is in your hands now." This took place (precise dialogue and all) in the story "And There Shall Come...a Leader!", published in the 1985 Annual, which many young readers would have received for Christmas not long before the publication of this story.
• It's not this story's fault so it's not fair to consider it an error, but Optimus Prime's decree that he will not use the Matrix to create super-warriors is turned into a lie six months later, when US stories require him to do exactly that to bring to life Omega Supreme in US issue #19, and later the Special Teams in issues #21-#24. This incongruity will be addressed in the 1986 Annual story "The Return of the Transformers."

Transformers references

• As a product of the above-mentioned advertising plan, Ravage's role in the first part of "Crisis of Command!" is loosely inspired by the cartoon episodes "More than Meets the Eye," Part 2 and Part 3. In the cartoon, Ravage and Soundwave infiltrate the Ark, only for Ravage to be captured in an energy net by the Autobots, then imprisoned and watched over by Mirage and Hound; in this story, Ravage infiltrates alone, and is captured in an energy net by Mirage and Hound (right). Later, in Part 2 of the comic, Bumblebee tracks Ravage using infra-red vision, which is how the Autobots found him to catch him in the cartoon, though there, it was Gears who used it, since infra-red vision is actually supposed to be one of his unique powers, per his bio.
• Though less obvious, in-keeping with this understanding of how the story was written, it seems likely that the comic's scenes of Bumblebee fleeing through the desert from the Decepticons in vehicle mode, only to be stopped by Starscream, were inspired by similar material from "Transport to Oblivion."

Continuity and plotting errors

• When the Decepticons confront Bumblebee in the Hill-written Part 2, Buzzsaw and Frenzy are both part of the group, but the pair are unaccounted for in the Collins-penned Part 3, the only 'Cons not defeated by Optimus. Again, this probably has something to do with the cartoon influence on this story, as neither had appeared in it at the time this story would have been written and drawn.
• The start of Part 3 shows Sunstreaker among the Autobots present. Both issue #31 and US issue #10 stated Sunstreaker was too badly damaged for Ratchet to be able to repair him, and he won't be seen again until several inactive Autobots are brought back online in US issue #41.

Artwork and technical errors

• Gina Hart is incorrectly credited with colouring Part 2; a correction published in issue #52 clarified that John Burns and Stuart Place were responsible, and that Place also assisted Hart on Part 3.
• Presumably as a result of the cartoon being referenced for the new marketing plan, two artistic inconsistencies jump out: in part 1, page 10, panel 3, the Ark is drawn to match its cartoon appearance (though still coloured comic-accurate grey, as seen at right), and in Part 3, Rumble uses his piledriver arms, which are not a feature of the character in the Marvel comic (but which did previously appear in "Decepticon Dam-Busters!" for similar, cartoon-inspired reasons).
• Repeating a common recurring error from early Marvel UK stories, Optimus Prime has an all-blue mouthplate throughout part 1.
• Part 1, page 1: Mirage is missing his shoulder-mounted rocket launcher. Bluestreak's forehead crest is grey instead of red. Gears is colored as Sideswipe.
• Part 1, page 4:
  • Panel 2: Mirage is still missing his launcher. Bumblebee is replaced in the Autobot group with... Beachcomber?? Colourist Gina Hart has coloured him black and yellow like 'Bee, but that error pales next to the fact the character is present at all; he has not yet debuted in the comics, and when he does (in US issue #17), it will be under circumstances that preclude him from ever having been here.
  • Panel 3: Mirage now has his launcher, but he's coloured like Sideswipe.
• Page 7, panel 1: Bluestreak is coloured like Prowl.
• Throughout Part 2, Prowl's forehead crest is coloured entirely red, lacking the white portion in the middle.
• Part 2, page 4: Hound's thighs are colored green like the rest of his legs, instead of white.
• Part 2, page 6, panel 1: Rumble and Frenzy both have dark blue faces. Depending on how close the UK coloring is hewing to the limited palette of the US comic, these should be very pale blue at best, or the same greyish as their guns (though Rumble's gun is incorrectly colored black here, now you mention it). Skywarp's face is also blue, when it should be the roughly same black as the rest of him; the rest of the story gets it right.
• Part 2, page 11, panels 3-4: Prowl is coloured sort of like Bluestreak, but with a blue chest instead of grey, white thighs instead of red, and a grey forehead crest instead of red.
• Throughout Part 3, Bumblebee's horns (which are drawn more like blunt nubs) are colored green, and Soundwave has an all-blue mouthplate.
• Part 3, page 1:
  • Wheeljack is coloured all-blue.
  • Bluestreak is coloured like Bumblebee. The colours of Bumblebee's arm are partially inverted; it's got the correct black/blue forearm and fist, but a black/blue shoulder and yellow bicep, instead of vice versa.
  • Hound is drawn far too short, only coming up to Jazz's chest.
• Part 3, page 2:
  • Panel 4: Wheeljack's still all blue.
  • Panel 5: Prowl's forehead crest is white.
• Part 3, page 3, panel 2: Ratchet is colored like Prowl.
• Part 3, page 11, panel 4: Ironhide is drawn to look like his headless toy. Well, we assume it's Ironhide; it might be a generic. It's all-white, which suggest Ratchet, but he's in the foreground of the panel already, so it's probably just block-colouring.

Other Trivia

• The first panel of Part 1 was (somewhat poorly) pasted onto the two-page spread of the Autobots introducing themselves in The Transformers: The Complete Works Part 1. The original pair of panels (showing the Decepticons escaping the Ark and Prowl talking to Optimus Prime) had been omitted when the spread was turned into a pull-out poster for the UK's version of The Transformers issue #2, replaced with the series' logo. Evidently the original panels had become lost when it came time to reprint the story for Complete Works, requiring the substitution.
• John Stokes swipes more art from other issues, and even a Big Looker storybook (see right).
• While the toy bio, cartoon and US issues all portrayed Soundwave as little more than a stoic loyalist to Megatron, this story is significant as the first instance of him being depicted as a strong, competent leader in his own right, focused on strategy and cunning over reckless offensives. This interpretation, despite being seemingly at odds with how he was characterized throughout much of the franchise, would go on to be the main portrayal for him in the UK stories, and eventually be solidified as the default characterization for the character, being utilized in both IDW continuities and the Energon Universe.

Back-up material

Issue #42:

• Back-up strips: Machine Man ("Victory," Part 4), Robo-Capers and Matt and the Cat. The Machine Man back-up concludes this issue.
• Fact File Interface: Blitzwing and Tracks
• Soundwave resumes control of the letters page from Ratchet after a one-issue absence.

Issue #43:

• Back-up strips: Iron Man ("Night of the Octopus," Part 1), Robo-Capers and Matt and the Cat

Issue #44:

• Back-up strips: Iron Man ("Night of the Octopus," Part 2), Robo-Capers and Matt and the Cat

Covers (3)

• Issue #42: Ravage infiltrating the Ark, by Will Simpson.
• Issue #43: Bumblebee facing down Decepticon weapons, by John Ridgway.
• Issue #44: Optimus Prime takes on the Seeker trio, by Jeff Anderson.

• 

  Issue #42

• 

  Issue #43

• 

  Issue #44

Reprints

• 

  Collected Comics #8; cover by Robin Smith (Marvel UK, 1988)

• 

  The Transformers Classics UK Volume 1 (IDW Publishing, 2011)

• 

  Transformers: The Definitive G1 Collection, Vol. 3: Dinobot Hunt (Hachette Partworks Ltd, 2018)

The Classics UK reprint uses the version of the story from Collected Comics, lacking the individual "next time" boxes that end each chapter, and concluding with one that says "Continued in Collected Comics #9."

References