Ricky Church reviews Transformers: Beast Wars #10…
After sitting on the sidelines for the past couple issues, Optimus Primal and the Maximals are ready to take the fight to the Predacons after the arrival of a new team member for each faction. Transformers: Beast Wars #10 does a great job building up to a fight as the Maximals go on the offensive with Erik Burnham once again delivering solid character moments on both sides, including some that play on the classic relationships from the animated series.
For an issue that had a fair bit of exposition, the story was never bogged down with too much information. Instead, Burnham gave some pretty interesting backstory regarding the Golden Disk and how Megatron came to be in possession of it. While the origins of the Golden Disk seem to be much the same as Beast Wars, there’s enough room left open to diverge from the original’s source material, especially with the revelation the disc has travelled through time on several occasions. Given the other changes Burnham has introduced in this reimagining, along with the glimpse Megatron received at one of the disc’s records from a couple issues ago, it’s safe to say there may be more surprises for longtime fans.
The rest of the issue focused on the Maximals crafting their battle plan against the Predacon ship and it is at this point more of the character dynamics are explored. Rattrap shares his typical banter with Dinobot as well as the insubordination to Optimus he displayed in the early episodes of the series. The difference is Rattrap’s questioning of Optimus’ command is more understandable here as Optimus is new to command and is still finding his footing in this new setting. Beast Wars #10 sees Optimus Primal becoming more like his cartoon counterpart: confident, intelligent, stern when he needs to be and, based on the final page, very tough (and he was already tough to begin with). The only unfortunate aspect is how the newly joined Razorbeast is barely in the issue. Given he was just introduced in the previous issue, it would have been nice to see him interact more with the rest of the Maximals.
Josh Burcham’s art is well illustrated with his character designs and layouts. His body language for each of the bots really captures their character, particularly Dinobot’s smirks and Rattrap’s indignation. While light on action, Burcham’s Megatron vs Terrasaur fight (well, really a one-sided beat down from Megatron) is choreographed in easy to follow imagery Megatron’s ruthless power. Burcham’s colours are rich and vibrant and the easter eggs he includes of various transformers in the Cybertronian forms is fun to pick out.
Beast Wars #10 is a nice character and story driven issue that succeeds in developing the relationships between the individual Maximals and Predacons while posing intriguing questions about core elements to the Beast Wars lore. Despite the exposition, Burnham’s script flows well from one scene to the next without missing a beat and Burcham’s artwork is nicely detailed and animated. It perfectly sets a stage for an exciting battle against the Preds that will be a lot of fun to read next month.
Rating: 8/10
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