The Transformers movies have long been criticized for their subpar storytelling, due in no small part to director Michael Bay’s divisive style-over-substance aesthetic. Travis Knight’s 2018 Bumblebee film was widely regarded as a massive step in the right direction — but with its sequel, Rise of the Beasts, still a year away, only time will tell whether this upward turn will continue.
However, the Transformers series hasn’t been plagued with writing problems in every medium. Many hardcore fans prefer the Transformers comic books to the live-action films, particularly those in the 2005-2018 IDW Publishing continuity. And over their 13-year run, the IDW comics provided plenty of beloved Transformers stories that would be perfect material to adapt to the big screen.
Last Stand of the Wreckers
One major comic storyline that would be easily translatable to film is James Roberts and Nick Roche’s Last Stand of the Wreckers, a miniseries that turned several minor characters into fan favorites. The story focuses on the titular Wreckers, an elite Autobot strike force whose members tend to be as quirky as they are deadly. Their latest mission takes them to Garrus-9, an Autobot prison that’s been victim to a catastrophic jailbreak. Even worse, the prison itself has been taken over by Overlord, a cunning and bloodthirsty Decepticon super-soldier. And as the title implies, not all of the Wreckers will be making it back to Cybertron alive.
Despite being released in 2010, Last Stand of the Wreckers is strikingly similar to James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad. Both stories focus on a team of mostly-obscure characters who quickly endeared themselves to fans. And more importantly, they both have a unique tone that blends charming comedy with bleak tragedy, with many characters meeting grisly ends along the way. For those reasons and many more, Last Stand of the Wreckers is a perfect fit for a movie adaptation.
Chaos Theory
Previous movies have been synonymous with over-the-top action, but Bumblebee proved that a more grounded, character-focused Transformers story can be effective on the big screen. For a similar story, one need look no further than James Roberts and Alex Milne’s “Chaos Theory”, a two-part arc from Transformers #22-23. The story is split between two parallel plots from the past and present, both focused on Optimus Prime and Megatron. The main plot features Optimus having a face-to-face conversation with a captive Megatron, resulting in a tense debate filled with clashing ideals and bitter grudges.
Meanwhile, the flashback segments depict the events that led to Optimus and Megatron’s first meeting, before the Autobot-Decepticon war even began. In a rare in-depth look at pre-war Cybertron, Roberts not only explores the intricacies of Transformer society, but shows how the corruption at the heart of that society led Optimus and Megatron down the paths they’d eventually take. “Chaos Theory” is clever, compelling, and crucial to planting the seeds of future storylines. Plus, it’s a definitive character study for Optimus Prime and Megatron, the iconic protagonist and antagonist of the entire franchise. In other words, it’s exactly the kind of story the Transformers movies need to tell.
More Than Meets The Eye
Following “Chaos Theory”, the IDW comics began exploring uncharted territory by showing the aftermath of the Autobot-Decepticon war’s conclusion. One series born from this new status quo, Roberts and Milne’s More Than Meets The Eye, has been acclaimed by fans and critics and fans alike as quite possibly the greatest Transformers story ever told. MTMTE follows the impulsive glory-hound Rodimus and his motley crew of Autobots on the starship Lost Light, who venture into deep space in search of the mythical Knights of Cybertron. However, the true draw of the series isn’t its plot, but its characters.
Rather than the clear-cut heroes and villains the series is known for, MTMTE showcases a vast roster of messy, complex individuals. Its heroes struggle with trauma, insecurity, and dark secrets. Its villains, while typically vile and monstrous, are often products of the same societal problems that gave rise to the heroes’ own tragedies. MTMTE explores its cast in depth, turning a crew of silly, colorful robots into a family of broken people who find redemption through their bonds with one another. Equal parts space opera and Shakespearean tragedy, the series deals with themes of guilt, grief, romance, betrayal, redemption, oppression, revolution, and most of all, togetherness. Often hilarious, often heartbreaking, and always unforgettable, More Than Meets The Eye might be too long to be adapted into a single film, but there’s still countless things the movies can learn from it.
Dark Cybertron
One of the many iconic characters who wound up getting wasted in their live-action debut was Shockwave, the Decepticons’ resident mad scientist, who was little more than an extra in Dark of the Moon. However, Shockwave takes center stage in the Dark Cybertron comic crossover by James Roberts and John Barber, in which he takes advantage of Megatron’s defeat by enacting his own epic scheme to gain control of Cybertron. In order to further his own goals, he joins forces with two ancient legends of Cybertron who were long thought dead — the barbarous warlord Galvatron and the imperialist conqueror Nova Prime.
As Shockwave’s forces threaten Cybertron, Optimus Prime must grapple with the complicated legacy of the Primes in the form of his own villainous predecessor. By taking the role of Prime, is he guiding Cybertron towards a brighter future, or merely keeping it shackled to its past corruption? At the same time, Megatron begins to question his own beliefs as he watches Shockwave take his ideology to its logical extreme, to horrific results. In the end, Optimus and Megatron must join forces in order to protect Cybertron from its own would-be savior when Shockwave attempts to preserve his beloved homeworld for eternity — at the cost of the rest of the universe. Dark Cybertron is Transformers at its most spectacular and its most emotional, resulting in the perfect template for an action blockbuster that has both style and substance.