I haven’t done one of these in forever now have I!
Spoilers under the cut, I’ll try to keep it vague, but there ARE massive spoilers ahead.
I fucking loved this issue.
Okay shit I wanted to make a classy intro where I’m setting up the moment by explaining where we stand and not say what I thought about the issue immediately but fuck it, I can’t bring myself to, right out the gate, I loved this issue.
There’s a lot to say about it, but I’m on a tight schedule and there’s one thing in particular I’d like to talk about, namely the ending. I couldn’t quite put my finger on why I loved it so much yesterday night, but now, I think I have figured it out, and I have no idea if I can describe it, but here goes:
(also this is of course all my personal opinion, I’m speaking for myself in all of this, it’s not a universal truth or something, just my opinion!)
When I think back to MTMTE, it's always accompanied by how I felt reading the series, and there's a flavour to that. I often felt dread because so much bad shit happens, but I think this is where it gets into specifics, because MTMTE had this very distinct way of gut-punching, it's macabre and robot-specific, it has a grimness to it that only WORKS in MTMTE. I’ve made a lengthy post about franchise-specific horrors etc before, but basically, I adore it when a series has its very own, fresh, personal way of doing bad things to its characters (or good things! But that’s sadly not what we’re gonna talk about today :’D) and MTMTE, in my opinion, was fantastic at that.
I remember every sad/scary/horrifying/intense moment from the two seasons it had vividly, they stuck with me, they were done in this way only this series would do them, they had this flavour that I couldn’t compare to anything else I’ve read.
Now, Lost Light up until this issue felt different to me, and there’s a lot of reasons why. It’s not a bad different really, it’s just, different. There’s a new title, there’s a new artist, the characters are all in a completely different setting than they’ve been before, no more small-scale spaceship adventures, there’s an entire city they’re interacting with - it felt like a different series to me, and I remember thinking to myself “well, this is the new show I’m following, MTMTE is over” which, again, I don’t mean as a bad thing. But I read Lost Light differently, I had other expectations, other feelings when reading it, and that’s fine, but I did kinda miss MTMTE simply because I loved it so much, but I was prepared and willing to go with Lost Light and take it as a new thing, I was here for it too.
But then that ending happened.
And when things started to get wrong, there was this ping of “this feels familiar”. And as it went on, that taste came back, that very distinct taste of the macabre kind of shit MTMTE liked to pull, and I couldn’t put my finger on why I suddenly felt so happy despite being sad at first, but now I know that I just felt like coming home when I read the last couple pages.
And that’s why I loved this issue so much.
There was a lot going on that I found interesting and I wanna see where they’re going next, I’m happy they’re back in space, I am so excited for the next issue. But that gut-punch at the end? That’s some good ol’ MTMTE-style merciless fuckery, and I love it, I didn’t expect to feel so much and I am 100% here for this. Not because I’m happy about what happened, I don’t like seeing characters I’ve spent years with suffering like this, but because this is what MTMTE tasted like, and I’m so excited the journey is continuing with that goddamn delicious flavor of “Nothing you love is safe, asshole, but the good times will make the suffering worth it”.
And it only needed a poor tiny robot getting buried alive.
I just think... Tailgate being all "I've changed, and you haven't" is SO. UNTRUE. Like... Cyclonus... the guy who used to not even go to the bar on the ship, who used to brood alone, who would hardly socialize outside of "I am not a Decepticon"... The guy who at first glance found Tailgate to be annoying and an ignorant hazard. The guy who grew to care for that little guy, even before he got super powers... you think that isn't change? I don't know if they are a good fit. I can't answer that since Tailgate doesn't seem to feel like they are anymore, and that's fine. Whatever. Shit happens and people change and you move on. That's life. (That's La La Land, pfft.) But acting like he's the only one who's had personal growth?? Nah, frag off with that TG. You've both grown from where you were when you first hopped up on that ship.
