All Hail Megatron volume 2 TPB

Volume 2 trade paperback, originally issues 7-12

“All Hail Megatron” volume 2 collects the second half of the series into a single book. Like the first collection, this greatly improves the pacing of the story by avoiding a month’s break between chapters. The book collects covers in the back along with a few character sketches. I’m very quickly becoming a fan of the trade paperback format, though I doubt it will lead me to abandon monthly books. Without the monthly books succeeding, there won’t be any trade paperbacks.

It’s difficult to review these comics without falling back on the “this happens and then that happens” type of plot summary. There’s not much point in a recap like that, since someone could simply read the wiki summary or the books themselves if they want to know what happened. Some discussion of events is inevitable, but I’m going to try and stick with broader ideas and themes.

But so much of the story hinges on the actions of one character and what’s happened to him that I have to focus on his story at first. That character is, of course, Sunstreaker. As the story reveals early in volume 2, it was he who was both directly and indirectly responsible for the Decepticons winning the war. For all the talk of “All Hail Megatron” ignoring or contradicting some of what came before it, so much of what happens in the story does so because Sunstreaker was captured along with Hunter O’Nion and forcibly converted into a Headmaster by Scorponok and the Machination. Sunstreaker was tortured, humiliated and taken apart to be used as a weapon against his fellow Autobots. For an individual as proud and vain as he was, it was a deeply disturbing experience. And though his body was restored, the events continued to haunt him, causing him to turn his back on Hunter.

Enter Bombshell, created by Megatron to take advantage of the captured Hunter and the Headmaster components integrated into the human. Had Sunstreaker not abandoned him, it’s possible that Hunter would not have been captured and used against the Autobots. Had Sunstreaker been able to heal and come to terms with his experiences, he might not have made the stupid mistake of trusting Starscream. The Autobots’ entire defense network is compromised thanks to Hunter’s unique nature, and the Autobot group under Prime is defeated thanks to Sunstreaker’s desire to lash out and gain revenge on humanity for what one small group of them did to him. Had Sunstreaker been able to stand firm on principle, much of what happened would not have happened, and the Decepticons would not have won. It’s little wonder that Sunstreaker is essentially driven to suicide by Insecticon, telling Ironhide that he wants to die. Watching Ironhide beat up Mirage when he was the guilty party seems to have been the final straw.

What brought down the Autobots? It can essentially be boiled down to one individual who chose revenge over a higher moral principle and couldn’t rise above the admittedly terrible events he had lived through. It’s been made clear that the Autobots in IDW’s continuity are not the noble characters that we’ve seen in the past, and that there isn’t a lot of difference between them and the Decepticons when it comes to the way the two groups fight the war. The Autobots are willing to endure “acceptable losses” for the purpose of fighting the greater war. Even Optimus Prime has been shown as less than concerned with individual life up to this point. All of that begins to change as the Autobots debate whether or not they are worthy of surviving at all, and Optimus Prime begins to “grow a conscience” as Megatron later terms it. It very much seems that the break from the war and the enforced period of inactivity has caused at least some of the Autobots to rethink who they are and what methods they should be employing. Had Prime or any of the other Autobots thought Hunter worthy of protection, they might have been able to prevent what happened, so in that sense they all share the blame with Sunstreaker. It’s good to see Prime beginning to grow beyond that at the end of the story, and his leadership is certain to influence the others under his command.

It goes without saying that the lack of concern for individual life is a flaw that most, if not all Decepticons share. This is most apparent in their treatment of humanity as they kill tens of thousands in their assault on New York and other areas around the Earth. But it’s also apparent with the creation of the Swarm. Megatron knew beforehand that the experiment designed to produce a genius like Bombshell was likely to produce thousands of failures before any success was achieved, and yet he proceeded anyway, much to Thundercracker’s displeasure. “Our own kind!” he shouts at Megatron, before walking away in disgust. This lack of regard for even fellow Decepticon life leads the Decepticons to turn on each other far more easily than the Autobots do, which is why Ironhide’s attack on Mirage is so shocking. We expect fratricidal behavior from Decepticons, but not from Autobots. It’s realistic but at the same time disappointing to see that under the right circumstances, even a stalwart like Ironhide can crack.

The contrast with fellow Decepticons’ behavior is also why Thundercracker’s anger at the treatment of the failed Insecticon experiments stands out, since he appears to be the only one to aspire to a higher standard of treatment when it comes to the others who follow the same cause that he follows. The fact that even Megatron as leader and standard-bearer cannot live up to Thundercracker’s ideals is a great disappointment to him, setting up his actions in the middle and end of the story as he quickly grows dissatisfied with the casual slaughter of humans and as he prevents the mass destruction of many more with the nuclear bomb. “All Hail Megatron” presents the reader with possibly the best use of Thundercracker we’ve seen, as he goes from being the other half of the “Thundercracker and Skywarp” pair to an idealistic individual who is perfectly willing to commit immoral actions, but only up to a point and for certain reasons. He’s still a villain, but a villain with standards, which makes him far more interesting than he’s been in the past. The potential was always there, and it’s good to finally see it tapped.

The other major plot thread running through the story, which comes to a head in volume 2, concerns the plans and actions of the post-war, victorious Megatron. Having finally obtained the long-sought victory over the Autobots, Megatron rather suddenly finds himself faced with having to tame the monster he’s created in the form of the Decepticon army. As that army had formed and as the war had dragged on, Megatron had led them more and more in the direction of doing anything to win. In theory, all Decepticons should have been much more like Thundercracker in terms of outlook, rather than brutal, bloodthirsty murdering thugs. Megatron is fully aware that without a common enemy in the form of the Autobots that they will turn on him and each other at some point, and he rightly knows that Starscream will be the leader of that coup attempt, as usual. The attack on Earth is a delaying action for the most part, giving his army something to keep them occupied while he waits for the inevitable uprising, so he can cull the Decepticons who don’t meet his ideals. Interestingly, he spends no small amount of time trying to convince Starscream to live up to his supposed higher ideals, and even telling him that he will one day succeed in taking leadership from Megatron. Starscream, interestingly, claims to act because of what he sees as the failed leadership of Megatron, who was able to win the war but had no clear plan for victory after that.

That leads to the themes of leadership and focus that pervade the story, and the contrast between Optimus Prime and Megatron. For most of the story, the Autobots are falling apart despite the capable presence of Prowl and Jazz, and later Kup. It’s only when Optimus Prime is finally repaired and among them again that the Autobots rally. He is able to inspire and motivate them even in the most hopeless of situations. Megatron on the other hand had offered the Decepticons a philosophy to aspire to, but in the end it turns out to be hollow, and Megatron has to lead as he always has, by being powerful enough to fend off all challengers to his position. He simply is incapable of inspiring his followers in the same way that Optimus Prime does. Megatron needs an enemy to focus his troops against, to force them to band together against the common foe. When that foe is the clearly inferior humanity, it’s not enough. The hollowness of the Decepticon cause is readily apparent for all with the intelligence to see it, like Thundercracker. The Autobots recognize their flaws and begin the process to change, led by Prime’s example. The Decepticons fragment and turn on each other as their flaws are exposed, and the one guy who tries to live up to his ideals is punished for it.

The basic story and premise are good, but as detailed above, what makes this story so strong are the underlying moral and philosophical dilemmas. Taken together with volume 1, “All Hail Megatron” is one of the stronger Transformers stories I’ve read. It has something to say, and it makes very good use of the characters, including some whose potential has never really been exploited before. It’s well worth a read.