The Transformers Issue 4
Optimus Prime vs. Megatron!
Published: Thursday 1st November 1984
UK No. 1: “Freedom” - Wham!
The fourth issue of The Transformers hit the shelves of all good UK newsagents on Thursday 1st November 1984 and for the past week and a half we’ve been enjoying a new, home grown, UK number 1 hit single… “Freedom” by Wham! knocked Stevie Wonder off the top spot 2 days after issue 3 was published and I have very vivid memories of George and Andrew plastered all over the TV, radio and newspapers… but what was plastered on the cover of Issue 4 of The Transformers? Well this of course!
This issue is the first to share its cover art with that of the US comic, namely that of issue 2, with some small changes of course. We see Bumblebee’s terrified face as Megatron, clutching Sparkplug, stomps on him and fires his fusion cannon directly into Optimus Prime’s chest! That’s right, Megatron is on the cover… finally! The big bad gets centre stage, which makes it all the more of a shame that his face is a bit wonky. This cover was brought to us by artist Michael Golden, this is his only cover for the series and the slightly odd face on Megatron aside it’s a doozy. The composition, the action, the high stakes… exciting isn’t it?
Once inside we are hit by the usual intro page, a mixture of letters and to be quite frank… relentless advertising! Outside of trying to sell the kids two board games that both sound like home work disguised as ‘fun’, we have our second Autobot fact file!
Continuing the obscurist take on profiling the Autobots we get to learn about everyone’s 16th favourite Autobot.. Gears! The image and text are straight from the toy packaging again and, to be honest, he sounds like a bit of a prick!
In the letters Malcolm from Weybridge finds Machine Man a let down and Robot Round-up a distraction… “The title strip ‘The Transformers’ is becoming quite interesting and should be allowed more pages.” he says. All in good time Malcolm!
On the following page we are thrown back into that ‘quite interesting story’. The Decepticons are building castles again and inside it is decided that if Sparkplug is gonna help anyone convert earth fuel into Transformer fuel it’s gonna be them not the Autobots! “Decepticons away!”
As we know the Autobots were already en-route to Witwicky Auto Repair. They arrive and Optimus Prime, not giving a second thought to his disguise, transforms into a giant robot in broad daylight/ This of course scares the bejesus out of everyone… no matter because moments later the Decepticons attack and this suburban street becomes a war zone!
We meet Autobot ‘brothers’ Sunstreaker and Sideswipe and are introduced to their Electron Pulse Gun and Energy-draining Rocket Backpack respectively. Sideswipe uses the latter to fly up into the sky and we are treated to the first “Aiee” in Transformers comic book history.
In their own head Prowl congratulates his logic circuits and Mirage laments that he’d rather be ‘retro-wing gliding’ than participating in a fire fight… fair enough? Neighbours witnessing all this have, rightly so, called the police who quickly decide, rightly so, this is no job for them and the army should be called in. This all scans as very sensible.
The next two pages consist of the latest instalment of Robot Round-Up. Malcolm from Weybridge would not be impressed! My favourite part of this ‘distraction’ is a little fluff article on robots in pop songs. Kraftwerk, Gary Numan, Dee D Jackson are all mentioned and the article asks why such artists write about robots? The verdict is it is because they feel disillusioned and like they are being treated like machines… cheery!
Back to the story and whilst everyone is scrapping Megatron has taken the opportunity to sneak up on Sparkplug, Buster and Bumblebee. Quite how he’s achieved this is left to our imaginations but it allows him to get the drop on Bee and scoop up Sparkplug. Optimus, alerted to this by Buster’s hollering, demands that Megatron release Sparkplug! They, of course… scrap… in a scrap yard!
Megatron makes his plan quite clear to the “self-righteous dolt”. He’s going to destroy the Autobots, seize the planet and turn it into a launching ground for his invasion of Cybertron… standard Megatron then. Starscream grabs Sparkplug, turns into a jet and the bad guys escape. “Decepticon’s Away!” says Megatron says for a second time. Is Jim Salicrup trying to coin a new catch phrase?
Before the final page of the story there SHOULD be an advert for Marvel UK’s Spider-man comic, which we’ll soon discover is a fine bit of cross promotion, as well as two more Transformers posters culled from that advert again, but I don’t have these pages… so! moving on...
“Optimus, you’ve got to go after them! They have my dad!” shouts Buster, of course Prime agrees but with no fuel they are fuuuuuucked.
“Next: and along came a Spider-man” Weren’t expecting that were you? Well maybe you were, it is a 40 year old comic.
After that bombshell, much to the annoyance of this issue’s mascot Malcolm from Weybridge, we start a brand new Machine Man story. “Where Walk the Gods” originally appears in Machine man issue 12 released in September 1979. Much like the previous issue, it’s written and drawn by comic book legends Marv Wolfman and Steve Ditko. In this 10 page, half issue Machine Man thwarts a number of crimes whilst being shunned for being different.. Learning some tough lessons about humanity along the way. Then a chemistry lab accident transformed some people into shiny golden people who then attack our hero… standard Marvel comics stuff really.
The now customary “Coming in Transformers” page tells us…
So that was issue 4 of The Transformers in a nutshell. thanks for reading! Be sure to join me next time for the fabulous fifth issue of The Transformers, here on Dumb Stubbies! Thanks for subscribing.