Fight or Flee (issue)

« The Transformers: Punishment #2 »
"Fight or Flee"
Publisher	IDW Publishing
First published	June 2014
Cover date	2014
Story by	John Barber
Art by	Livio Ramondelli
Letters by	Tom B. Long
Continuity	2005 IDW continuity
Chronology	Current era (2014)
Price	Free (Windows 8 Madefire app, initial) ??? (Other digital platforms)

A Decepticon riot leads to three more deaths.

Synopsis

Starscream and Optimus Prime take to the air to escape the Decepticon mob, who continue trying to shoot at Optimus. But among the horde, Optimus notices Heavy Barrel trying to sneak away with a curious package, and the Autobot returns to the ground to investigate.

Heavy Barrel flees to meet up with his partners-in-crime in an alley, only to find Ransack and Stratotronic dead. Wondering who would want bootleggers dead, Heavy Barrel transforms into alternate mode and flies off, only to have Optimus shoot him down. Heavy Barrel crashes into a building, but Optimus is too late before he gets to him as the Decepticon killer blasts a hole through Heavy Barrel's head and chest before disappearing. After calming down the riot, Starscream gets back to Optimus and the two mull over the dead Decepticon.

The Decepticon crowd assembles again to blame Optimus for the three Decepticon murders, but the Autobot explains that Heavy Barrel and his partners were using the cover of the riot to steal an engex distiller, a minor crime undeserving of death. Barricade looks over Stratotronic's body and notes to Windblade that the deceased was a friend of Gutcruncher and helped him open his bar. Windblade and Optimus follow this lead, with Optimus noting the obvious connection between the bar and the engex distiller.

At the bar, Optimus and Windblade meet an antagonistic Gutcruncher and a dissatisfied Sandstorm who rebukes any affection from Optimus, making it clear that he is done with the Autobots after his experiences behind enemy lines. Optimus informs Gutcruncher of his friend's death and the furious Decepticon asks Optimus to leave the matter up to them, a request which Optimus refuses. While Gutcruncher is wary of Optimus's convictions if the killer turns out to be an Autobot, Sandstorm believes in Optimus's honest nature and joins the investigation.

Optimus tries to have a talk with his old friend at one of the murder scenes, but Sandstorm won't have it and finds a curious shell that he recognizes. But their conversation is cut short as Windblade calls in to inform the two of some bad news... a blaze is consuming Gutcruncher's bar!

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Quotes

"There's a reason I don't have a flying mode, Starscream. I've always found it best—to stay grounded."

—Optimus Prime

"Optimus Prime never executed nobody, Decepticon—but don't push your luck with me."

—Slug, to Sparkstalker

"You okay, Barricade? You look rough."
"I can't stand this stuff."
"The killing?"
"A Decepticon warrant officer gets used to killing, Windblade. It's everything else."

—Windblade and Barricade

Notes

Continuity notes

• Ransack's only prior appearance in IDW continuity was as a disembodied spark being held at Garrus-9 in Spotlight: Arcee.
• Gutcruncher's last known location was on Earth, in Skywatch custody, per Bumblebee #3. Logically, as with all Decepticons captured by Skywatch, he would have been freed in the Decepticon attack on Skywatch's base seen in issue #14 of the 2009-2011 ongoing series and then returned to Cybertron.
• Sandstorm's time spent behind enemy lines was previously mentioned in "Bullets" as the reason he couldn't participate in the Wreckers' latest mission.
• Prime notes that Sandstorm "left for the outer rim on a quest for the truth" after the end of the war; his absence from Cybertron had previously been (indirectly) highlighted in Robots in Disguise #7. Since he was back on Cybertron by the time of Megatron's trial (as seen in More than Meets the Eye #28), and he was never seen before that point in More than Meets the Eye), it remains unclear if he was aboard the Lost Light, or whether he had spent some time off-world on his own.

Transformers references

• This issue is named after the Generation 1 cartoon episode "Fight or Flee".
• Heavy Barrel and Skidmark (the latter unnamed until issue #5) are straight continuity transplants of the two Cybertron Mini-Cons of the same names. Heavy Barrel has a flying alternate mode, though, rather than the tank mode of his toy.
• "Hi-and-die" generic Stratotronic is named after Gutcruncher's Stratotronic Jet.
• The unnamed robot at Gutcruncher's bar who looks like Bomb-Burst is actually his Super-God Masterforce counterpart Blood.^[1] Like the other Masterforce Pretenders who appear in this series, he is set apart from the IDW incarnation of his American counterpart by resembling the original toy's inner robot, rather than its shell.
• Blood and Skidmark's fellow bar patron, Morsa, is a new character visually based on Squeezeplay, with a purple and grey color scheme. His name was the Italian-market moniker for Squeezeplay's original Generation 1 toy.

Foreign Localization

Swedish

• Title: "Fly eller fäkta" ("Fight or Flight")

Covers (2)

• Digital cover: Starscream carries Optimus through a hail of laser fire, from the issue's first page, by Livio Ramondelli
• Print cover: Optimus Prime and the Dinobots, by Ramondelli

Reprints

• The Transformers: Punishment (January 21, 2015)
  • Collects Punishment issues #1–5.
  • One-shot format.

• The Transformers: Redemption of the Dinobots (March 14, 2018) ISBN 1684051835 / ISBN 978-1684051830
  • Collects Punishment issues #1–5, Redemption, and Salvation.
  • Bonus material includes a cover gallery.
  • Trade paperback format.

• The Transformers: The IDW Collection Phase Two: Volume 8 (December 5, 2018) ISBN 1684053722 / ISBN 978-1684053728
  • Collects More than Meets the Eye issues #35–38 & #39–40, The Transformers (2012) issues #35–38, Punishment issues #1–5, and Drift - Empire of Stone issues #1–4.
  • Hardcover format.

• Transformers: The Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 70: Punishment (October 30, 2019)
  • Collects Punishment issues #1–5, Redemption, and Salvation.
  • Bonus material includes an article about the Motion Book Tool app used for the digital version of Punishment, a "Brief History of the (IDW) Dinobots", and a Livio Ramondelli sketchbook, a cover gallery and an introduction by Simon Furman.
  • Hardcover format.

• Transformers: Optimus Prime - Tillbaka till jorden (February 15, 2023)
  • Collects Robots in Disguise issues #28–32 & #34–38, and Punishment issues #1–5.
  • Swedish reprint. Hardcover format.

• 

  Punishment – cover art by Livio Ramondelli

• 

  Redemption of the Dinobots – cover art by Livio Ramondelli

• 

  The IDW Collection Phase Two: Volume 8 – cover art by Marcelo Matere

• 

  The Definitive G1 Collection: Volume 70: Punishment – cover art by Don Figueroa (Snarl) and Livio Ramondelli

• 

  Optimus Prime - Tillbaka till jorden – cover art by Casey Coller and Joana Lafuente

References