By 1990, Hasbro had all but moved on from the first generation of Transformers toys. This included the Marvel Comics series. According to writer Simon Furman, the staff at Marvel knew that Hasbro was no longer interested in the property when the writers submitted an April Fools script that saw the death of all of the Transformers as well as a battle royal between mechanical sheep and warrior nuns! When the toy manufacturer allegedly accepted the script, Furman and crew knew that they were now free to craft the Transformers universe as they saw fit.
Looking to incorporate parts of the 1986 feature-length movie, Furman and crew began what is called 'The Unicron Saga', starting in issue #69. First, Optimus Prime had to be raised from the dead. Even Hasbro admitted that it was a misstep. Although the resurrected version of the Autobot leader was more vulnerable and clunky looking as opposed to his sleeker original shell.
Then writers found a way to incorporate Galvatron; Unicron's updated and far more deadlier upgrade of the Decepticon leader Megatron. With Megatron dead from an explosion, Unicron plucked this version of Galvatron from an alternate future timeline. Not willing to be a lackey to anyone, Galvatron strives to overthrow Unicron by any means possible. Even if that means having to team up with Optimus Prime!
Lastly, the creative team needed a hook to pit all of the Transformers together in order to battle the massive Unicron. The solution: a prophecy from the robots' god-like creator, Primus. According to legend, if all of the children of Cybertron can unite together as one, then and only then can the chaos bringer that is Unicron be defeated. After millions of years of in-fighting and 74 American issues of sequential art, the Autobots and Decepticons seem ready to face the coming onslaught as one!
'All Fall Down' was the penultimate collection of Marvel reprints of the original series that ran from 1984-1991. However, this is book 13 out of a series of 16 volumes. In the early 2000s, Titan Books released a 16-volume set that reprinted all 80 issues of the main Transformers series published by the House of Ideas. The 12 issue sequel series Transformers: Generation 2 is the material that fills volumes 15 and 16. So, even though the next volume 'End of the Road' promises to be the closing chapter to the robots in disguise, like with all good franchises, the stories themselves never really end.
Rating: 6 out of 10 stars.
Completing this review completes Task #45 (About Robots) of the 2023 Comic Book and Graphic Novel Reading Challenge.
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