The Transformers- 'Target: 2006' Retrospective, 'Prologue.'

by Dave Scrimgeour and Kevin McCluskey

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Script- Simon Furman
Art- Jeff Anderson
Letters- Richard Starkins
Colours- Tony Jozwiak
​Editor- Ian Rimmer​

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synopsis

On Cybertron, Operation Volcano is baited, and set by Emirate Xaaron and the Autobot resistance, whilst on earth, during an inspirational speech to his Autobot troops, Optimus Prime, and his lieutenants Prowl and Ratchet, suddenly disappear into thin air.  This is swiftly followed by the arrival on Earth of three new Decepticons, who claim to be from the future.  Could these two incidents be linked, perhaps?

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​Dave
'Target: 2006,' it is.  This is really going back to when we started collecting comic books.  Do you still have your original copies?


Kev
I do indeed.  Let's just say that my original copies have seen better days.  They've been, "well read."  This is perhaps right in the middle of the height of my Transformers fandom.  Arguably its zenith.  I'm just about to turn 9, years old, the Ultra Magnus and Galvatron toys are on my Christmas list for that year, the movie's out in a few months, this is peak Transformers for me.


Dave
I do remember us reading this story, and the announcement of the movie as well.   I'm just trying to get to grips with this.   Is this a build up story to the movie then?


Kev
Kind-of.  Certainly in terms of the marketing for the movie’s release in the UK.  It ties into the movie.  This story actually takes place during the movie, in that Galvatron, Cyclonus and Scourge time jump at a specific point in the film, and that’s what leads to this. 


Dave
Cool.  That makes sense then.  At this stage in our Ben-Day dots coverage, and being the massive Transformers fan that you are, do you feel that this is a good choice to see in the 5th year of Ben-Day Dots?


Kev
I think so, yeh.  It feels like it's taking it full circle for me.  Almost like going back to the source of my comic fandom.


Dave
I'm pretty sure this was the first comic book we started collecting, and at that stage we would have been getting them from RS McColls, I reckon.  Them and the ‘Action Force’ reprints as well.  They were a larger page size to US comics.


Kev
Yep.  I still have all our Action Force ones as well.  They're in even worse nick than the Transformers ones.  I still have a soft spot for that larger format UK comic.  It's like coming home for me.  This was certainly the first one I was collecting on a regular basis.  And you're right about RS McColl.  I used to get it delivered from there every week.  My order number was 93.  Which was always written in pencil on the cover.  So that was them ruined.  Ha, ha!


Dave
I reckon, at that period, US comics weren't so easy to find in local newsagents, and we hadn't discovered The Black Hole yet.


Kev
No, it would be a few years before we discovered The Black Hole.   You used to get US comics in newsagents, but you're right, they were a bit hard to find, and they were a bit hit or miss, in terms of what issues would come in when.


Dave
No consistency in keeping up to date, just now and again?


Kev
Yeh, you would always drop issues here and there, and just have to fill in the blanks with the recaps.  Transformers was definitely what me and Mike bonded over initially.  He was like an oracle on them at that point.  He knew them inside out and back to front.  I thought I was pretty well versed in it, until I met Mike.


Dave
Yep, he certainly did.  Transformers and Action Force had such a large range of characters in them.  That meant it was also a joy to constantly discover new characters.


Kev
Comics based on toy lines were always introducing new characters.  Anyone'd think they were just trying to sell you toys.  Jeez, discovering The Black Hole in In Shops at the back of the Wellgate Centre was like a dream come true back then.  And it was tiny, come to think of it.


Dave
And George getting annoyed, as we treated the place like a "library."


Kev
Ha, ha!  Yeh.  Pretty sure George used that line on us more than once.  Don't blame him, looking back on it now. 


Dave
And once we saw all the graphic novels he was selling, that was hard going as kids, as that was a big spend, and we just generally couldn't afford to buy most of them.  That was a torment in itself for three comic book enthusiasts.


Kev
It really was, eh?  It's not like any of us had rich parents.  £10/£15 for a graphic novel was Christmas or birthday money stuff.


Dave
Plus, that on top of what we were already buying.  And let's not forget the weekly visits to the arcade, which was another money burner.  Nothing has changed, really.  Broke as kids, and still broke as adults.


Kev
Ha, ha!  And still for the same reasons.  Well, maybe not the arcade. 


Dave
God, I remember only having so much I could afford to spend in the arcade, and looking at most games wishing I could play them.


Kev
Yeh.  If you only had a quid or two, at 30p-50p per credit, it didn’t go far, did it?


Dave
Indeed.  I suppose, on that note, we should get started on the actual issue.  Haha.  Before we go off on another tangent.


Kev
Ha, ha!  Yeh, so The Transformers, Target: 2006.....  What do you think of this cover by Alister Pearson?  I think it’s a good tease.  It certainly had me wondering what on earth was going on here, back in the day?  It’s maybe not a stone cold classic, but it certainly does its job. 


Dave
It's not much of an eye-catching cover.  I think the tagline, "The shocking fate of Optimus Prime," would be the real attention grabber.


Kev
Definitely.  They loved making-out that Prime was in peril, in order to pull in the readers.  Which, of course, by the time we get to the events of the movie, he really was.


Dave
I like the first panel of Prime, on the very first page, and the way Target: 2006 is lettered.  That’s just a good eye grabbing pic.

Amazon Prime performing a little bit of deforestation.

Kev
Yeh, it's a brilliant opening panel by Jeff Anderson.  His rendering of this woodland area is superb.  I have to admit, like a lot of people, Geoff Senior was my favourite Transformers artist, probably still is, but Anderson was probably my second favourite at this point.  He may not have had the same kinetic dynamism that Senior did, but his stuff was more beautiful in a way.  It was always very pretty.  The colours by Tony Jozwiak don’t hurt either.  Beautifully painted in that more traditional UK comics style, before the comic fully committed to the US style, mechanical separation colour process.  Again, it just makes the woods look incredible.


Dave
And the way the actual faces on the Transformers are drawn, such as Prowl on the third panel, is very human looking.  Which makes them more relatable.


Kev
Anderson definitely made them more human looking, yeh.  And Furman always gave them very "human" flaws as well.  
 
 
Dave
And this first page is quite humorous, as Optimus Prime is having a good rant about the Dinobots.


Kev
Ha, ha!  Yeh.  Furman was always great at linking his stories together.  This little recap of ‘In The National Interest’ is great.  I love the Prowl profile/ flashback panel at the top of page 2.  Clever stuff by Anderson.

Prowl's got more back to that head of his than a Titans Return toy.

​Dave
I really like that panel as well, it has a real cinematic feel to it.


Kev
These epic Transformers stories that Furman penned always had that big screen summer blockbuster feel to them.  Incidentally, this is a much kinder, gentler Prowl than the arsehole he will become in later iterations.  He’s a proper second-in-command here.  It’s nice to be reminded of him in this way.


Dave
The first two pages are very wordy as well.  Plenty of narrative going on here.


Kev
Yeh, this is the old fashioned Marvel "Every issue is someone's first" recap here.


Dave
True.  Bearing in mind, they like to remind the reader of what happened previously.


Kev
Definitely.  Furman is planting a lot of seeds for the future here too though.  Prowl referring to The Matrix, and Optimus’s concerns about the Dinobots going A.W.O.L. leaving the Autobot ranks somewhat depleted, both of which will play major parts in this story as it progresses.


Dave
It is good at jumping quickly from scene to scene, as page 3 takes us to Cybetron now, with another full narrative to explain the situation there.  The first panel on page 3 is top notch artwork.  Very visual, and full of colour and detail.  We have gone from the bliss of the beach and forest setting, to something more dystopian here.

I suppose a war that has been waged for millions of years doesn't exactly make you a prime tourist destination.

​Kev
Yeh, from something that, to us, seems organic and “natural,” to something constructed and metallic.  I was always fascinated by the notion of two giant robots just wandering around in rural America.  When I was a youngster, I genuinely believed that America was so vast that a crashed alien spaceship could go undetected in a mountainside for over 4 million years.  And I loved the image of The Ark embedded in Mount St. Hilary.  As I do the ruins of the war torn Cybertron, in this case Iacon, here.  And here we are introduced to Emirate Xaaron, as well as Impactor.  The latter of whom finally got his own toy just the other year.  8 year old Kev’s head would’ve exploded at the possibility of an Impactor toy back in ‘86.  Just shows, if you wait long enough.....  But yeh, it's dystopian alright.


Dave
The blending of colours on this page is superb, and each character is instantly recognisable and different.  Unlike that cinematic pish we had to endure from Michael Bay for five movies.


Kev
Yeh, it was often difficult to determine who was who in those movies.  Particularly when they were fighting.


Dave
For me, as my knowledge of Transformers is quite limited now by my failing memory, I’m kind-of struggling to follow the story here on Cybertron.


Kev
Basically, by this point, The Decepticons have all but taken over Cybertron completely, and Xaaron and the rest of the Autobots have devised their 'Operation Volcano' plan as a kind of Hail Mary to try to take back some control.


Dave
The narrative jumping around so quickly doesn't help either.


Kev
No, that won’t be helping at all.  It's interesting that you should say that, as someone coming into it relatively cold, you feel that some prior knowledge is required to get the most out of it.


Dave
Yeah, just with the amount of characters this franchise had as well, it’s a lot to take in and to try to wrap your head around.  


Kev
That's true.  Even Furman and Budianski struggled with the sheer amount of toys they had to advertise, I mean characters they had to introduce.


Dave
Ah, and Xaaron, as we see over those few pages, is ultimately heading for disaster.


Kev
There is certainly a feeling of impending doom, right?  Speaking of which, Anderson’s image of Shrapnel’s gleeful face, as he electrocutes the nameless Autobot, is really quite disturbing.  And his design for Roadbuster is superb.

Starring Boris Johnson as Shrapnel.

​Dave
Maybe he was just addressing him just as "Autobot" as a form of disdain.  Perhaps they were doing the Star Trek speciality of killing off the extra quickly in the episode.


Kev
Ha, ha!  I reckon it's more likely to be the latter actually, yeh.


Dave
That is a good panel though of Shrapnel surrounded by electricity.  I was going to say that it is an “electrifying” panel, but that would’ve been too obvious.  Roadbuster looks very mechanical.   He doesn’t have any real human features.


Kev
It's certainly the opposite of Prowl from just a few pages earlier, yeh.


Dave
I've noticed each scene is preceded by one word.  On page 1 it’s “Prologue,” then page 3 it's “Cybertron,” and then, as we move to page 6,  it’s “Earth.”


Kev
Ah, that's a good spot.  Come to think of it, Furman did that quite a lot to set the scene.  Prime’s debriefing reminds me of a staff huddle at the beginning of a shift in my old work.  As time has gone on, and layers have been added to the Autobot/Decepticon war, this reads like exactly the sort of self-aggrandising, Autobot symbol waving, sort-of American bringing freedom and democracy to the world, propaganda that you could understand the Decepticons rebelling against. 


Dave
Optimus is the only Transformer who seems to be wearing his Covid mask.  Do you think he jumped forward another 14 years and saw what was going on?


Kev
Ha, ha!  Yeh, maybe that's where he ended-up after he disappears at the bottom of the next page.


Dave
It was always about not bringing the humans into the war, so why are they constantly surrounding themselves with them?


Kev
Yeh.  You'd think it'd dawn on them at some point, wouldn't you?


Dave
This issue is, with the exception of the scene on Cybertron, full of recaps.   And it really is a prologue, isn't it?  This is all just getting the reader up to speed.

 
Kev
Yeh, these 11 pages are all recap and set up.  Furman is getting all his ducks in a row, so to speak.  The bottom panel of Prime, Ratchet and Prowl disappearing into limbo is outstanding.  The “CHOOM!” sound effect is also class.  As are the shadows of the trio that are left on the floor in their wake.

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Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand for my next trick.....

Dave
I agree.  That bottom panel on page 7 is excellent.  Prime was always one for giving those slightly holier than thou speeches wasn't he?  I like the panel where Prime gets zapped.  The contrast of the yellow background to Prime’s red colours works so well.


Kev
He was a bit, eh?  He had a habit of coming across as a bit sanctimonious and condescending.  This is also where Furman really starts to play around with the concept of Cybertronian culture, in terms of things like tradition and ceremony.  The Matrix Flame, on what looks like an altar, Xaaron wearing the robe, it’s all very much like a religious ceremony.  The religious elements, including deities, was something he expanded upon in great detail over the next couple of years. 


Dave
It is indeed.  I can't decide if it has an eastern feel, or if it reminds me of ancient Egypt, but you know what I mean.  It has a very ceremonial feel to it.  Do you know who that was going up to the Matrix Flame?


Kev
I always just assumed it was Xaaron.  But it's not, is it?  It must just be some form of Cybertronian priest, or monk perhaps.


Dave
They should have been drawn with a cigarette in their mouth, getting ready to light it as the flame extinguished.  Then the bottom panel would show his anguish, as he can't get a light.


Kev
Ha, ha!  Yeh, screw Prime, I just can't get my robo-cigarette lit now.  Maybe he could just transform into a lighter.  I can’t see Hasbro signing-off on a Zippo lighter collaboration for kids in the ‘80s, right enough.


Dave
Even in the animated movie, they were big on the whole Matrix thing.  And as you say, this was kind of like a religious cult.


Kev
Yeh, Furman expands upon it, and loads of other writers have over the years as well.  James Roberts did some really interesting stuff with the idea of Cybertronian religion too.  Particularly the cult-ish aspects of certain faiths.


Dave
So far, this issue has been very bright in visuals, which is in contrast to the more dystopian setting, but even that has a good look.  No bland colours, and very ‘80s.  Bold in style.


Kev
Yeh, I always thought that the UK stories "popped" off the page more than the US reprints, due to the colouring and printing techniques.


Dave
Also, Furman is going full ‘60s’ Batman here in his writing, with the sound effects.   "Shrr-kam," "Choom,” and “Tha-Doom."  I’m just waiting for "Pow."

 
Kev
Ha, ha!  That was good old Richards Starkings on lettering duties.  The two of them loved a bit of onomatopoeia, so they did.  We might get to “POW!” before the end of this story, man.  That Oregon cereal farm looks like it could be somewhere in the English countryside.  Especially with the rain.  Again, beautifully depicted by Anderson and Jozwiak.

"Tha-Doom." Sounds like a hip-hop trio from Brooklyn in the mid '90s.

​Dave
It’s very fast paced, as we are now in yet another setting.

 
Kev
Yeh.  I don't think Furman liked to hang around when he was writing these.  Get in, achieve what you need to achieve, then get out.  He never wrote down to us readers at the time, but I also reckon he was all too aware that he was writing for a, certainly at this point, predominantly pre-teen audience, whose attention spans may not have been particularly long.  In saying that, my attention span was probably better back then as a kid, than it is as an adult these days.  So ruined has it been by the Youtubes, the Vines and the Tikkety-Toks.


Dave
The burning fire on the ground, at Galvatron’s feet, the shot of the back of his head, the close up of his face, are all effective in teasing the reader.  I like the aerial view of the farm on the top panel.  The scenic views, mixed with the robo tech, works well.  And Transformers appear, like a Terminator arriving.  The build up is really good, as we just get small glimpses of who has arrived on this particular page.


Kev
I agree, this is very Terminator-esque in the, “What year is this?”  I suspect that Furman was quite heavily influenced by 'The Terminator' whilst writing this.  It was published only a couple of years after that film's release after all.

"12th. May. Thursday."

​Dave
Yeah, it is such an iconic entrance in Terminator, that I think it must’ve played a big influence on this.  It is cinematic, and grand.


Kev
Indeed.  And then we have the trio of future Decepticons; Cyclonus, Scourge and Galvatron, whom Anderson has clearly not seen the movie character sheets of, and has based their look very heavily on the toys. 


Dave
Coupled with the sudden change in weather to signify the impending danger arriving.  


Kev
Yeh, that’s a cracking reveal on the splash page at the end.  And very horror inflected, what with the lightning strike and everything.


Dave
And those pesky humans, who can't mind their own business, having to see what is going on.


Kev
Ha, ha!  Yep.  Putting themselves in harm's way, once again.  Although, I always did like a little bit of human involvement.  Purely because it helped establish a sense of scale for the Transformers themselves.  It really did help make them seem larger than life.  And that really helped to capture my imagination back then.


Dave
I love that final splash page of Galvatron, Cyclonus and Scourge.   It is excellent.  It’s very menacing looking, and just spells out that there is indeed trouble ahead.  The attention to details is fantastic, and the shading and colours work really well.  As I have often said, this merits wall art.

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Said hip-hop trio. But hailing straight outta Cybertron in 2006.

​Kev
It's a Transformers classic, alright.  The issue really does just build, to this reveal, doesn't it?


Dave
Yeah.  The human and robot interaction adds to the relatability of it as well.  How many ‘80s’ films were there of humans and machines bonding, it became a craze for a while in ‘80s’ Hollywood?  When I say bonding, you know what I mean?  Nothing obscene.

 
Kev
Although, I’m sure there were a few of “those” too.  Computer technology certainly exploded in the '80s.  We literally invited them into our homes, and started to interact with them, to bond with them, on a daily basis.  And look where we are now.  We’ve got computers more powerful than pretty much anything that was available back then in our pockets, at our fingertips, on our wrists, 24/7, and what do we choose to do?  Watch cat videos on Instagram.


Dave
Haha, true.  We are literally too spoiled with technology.  I sometimes feel that technology is more of a hindrance than a help now.


Kev
It's certainly a double-edged sword, at the very least, isn't it?


Dave
I think also, when we look at what stage technology was at in ‘86, if it was anything like today, the human interaction would be minimal in this story.  They would all be standing about filming the Transformers arriving, then uploading it to YouTube.


Kev
Or running straight into the danger the Transformers presented, just to get a selfie with them.


Dave
Yeah, and probably standing around, protesting that they are damaging the environment as well.


Kev
Ha, ha!  Greta would be sailing halfway around the world to Oregon to make sure she was there to protest.  With her film crew in tow, of course.


Dave
Greta would give Optimus the "How dare you" speech.  Or probably to Galvatron, more likely.


Kev
In saying that, we couldn't do what we're doing right now, if it wasn't for the huge leaps technology has made in the last three and a half decades.


Dave
Very true, Ben-Day Dots would probably have been written on a notepad, and just kept on that.


Kev
Ha, ha!  We could've done it by post.  A single review would've taken years to complete, but hey.....


Dave
Also, the Transformers logo on the bottom of the final page, with the teaser title to the next issue, was a staple of that period as well.


Kev
As someone coming into this relatively fresh, 35 years after it was originally published, what do you make of it, in general? 


Dave
As a prologue issue, it is nicely fleshing out the story.  And it is wisely using the whole issue to do this, which I think is very much needed for this story, as it doesn't drag on at any stage.  Furman was that good a writer, he could pull this off.  It has quite an upbeat feel to it.  I liked that about Transformers.  But coming back to it, yeah, it has been an interesting read.  It has quick pacing, like the way ‘Dragon’s Claws’ had, jumping quickly from scene to scene, and the artwork is great, which makes it visually appealing as well.  What about yourself?  As a Transformers fan, how do you rate coming back to this issue?


Kev
I'll be honest, man, the chances of me being able to be even remotely objective about this are pretty much non-existent.  It's what made me into the comics fan I am today.  I'm still a total mark for it.  I just love it.

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No! Mean feet!

​Dave
Yeah, if we were doing Ben-Day Dots back in ‘86, the notepads would have been covered in those stickers we used to buy.  Do you remember all those comic book character stickers?


Kev
God yeah.  I still have one of my old notebooks with those Spidey stickers on it.


Dave
Yeah, I think we just decorated anything we could with them.  


Kev
Pretty much, yeh.


Dave
You and Mike were always massive Transformers fans, whereas I liked them, but I always preferred the Action Force comics to Transformers.  I think Action Force was my first regular collection.  But I think this is actually the perfect choice to see in 5 years of Ben-Day Dots.


Kev
​Considering we’ve been using a panel from it as our header, and avatar across all our social media accounts, yeah, it’s quite fitting.  But we should maybe do an Action Force story at some point as well though.


Dave
Yeah, let's face it, our past few reviews have been a lot more sombre in terms of the tone of the material.


Kev
That's a really good point, man.  This should be more "fun," in that we're not dealing with themes of suicide.


Dave
Or sadistic torture for prolonged periods.


Kev
Ha, ha!  Come to We See The World In Ben-Day Dots, where we explore torture, suicide and many more depressing themes, through the lense of old superhero comics.


Dave
We See The World In Non-Cheery Dots.


Kev
Ha, ha!  That's a great title.


Dave
Yeah, it was getting that way.

(D) & (K)

​Next: 'Apocalypse Then...Now!'