Finally gonna say my piece on how feel about a certain character from IDW 1, mainly for MTMTE and TLL.
It’s not okay the treatment of Getaway and how his character is now treated by the whole fandom/fanon to the point where it becomes uncomfortable for me to share that I like them.
This may be a long post so all my thoughts will be down below.
Warning for mentions of NSFW content and mentions of abuse/trauma
So right off the bat, the fandom’s treatment honestly makes me mad and so fucking uncomfortable that it has made me question if I should even bring this all up. How Getaway went from an MTO, which is basically a cybertronian's version of a child soldier, who struggled with the fact that the person responsible for his creation and trauma was not only NOT punished for their crimes, aka Megatron the genocidal warlord who nearly wiped out his whole race, with a slap on the wrist. A mech who was angry, a mech who was hurting, and not everyone on the ship agreed on giving Megatron a chance. Some of the mechs fought against Megatron’s army, most likely losing people they cared about or just the fact they may also have trauma but nothing as serious because they’re much older then Getaway.
But then his character was turned into a one-note, blood crazy, villain because of two things:
- shipping (tailgate/getaway and cyclonus/tailgate)
- because people agreed that Getawat was right about Megatron, with not only a majority of The Lost Light agreeing but the audience as well
The shipping is obviously a major point of how people view Getaway for manipulating Tailgate into trying to get Megs to nearly kill him. I can protest that it was indeed wrong but giving him small slide, a very tiny one, he might have thought that Tailgate could survive but even then he would’ve been in trouble. I get it, Tailgate is a sweet but naive character that people can't see him with an abusive character like Getaway.
Now to state, I came late into MTMTE and haven't read issues 40 and onwards.
But I can state wholeheartedly that what Getaway got as a punishment was fucking extreme that one would think he was a war criminal. He had his arms, legs, jaw, and voice box removed and was put into a device similar to what Overlord was placed in earlier in the comic’s run.
Sure, he nearly got Tailgate killed but one has to think that MAYBE the punishment was a bit too far.
Now then the shipping can sometimes be the toxic part of a fandom, I get it. I want to state I have no problems with the fandoms’ shipping of Cyclonus/Tailgate since it’s one of the popular ships. Shipping is usually one of the main forces for drama and this is one of them.
But now comes the part that makes my blood boil:
Getaway has his character assassinated then has said character reanimated into a zombie for their creator to control.
Now his character is portrayed as an abuser, a manipulator, or a straight up the most evilest being in IDW, and now Transformers in general, when there are more characters that are deserving of that. Can’t even look towards ao3 for him because it always one or more of these things below:
- abusive and manipulative partner
- rapist
- just pure evil
Getaway had depth to him just like every other character but as soon as it was hinted that Tailgate, whose a fan favorite during MTMTE and TLL, was in danger people were unsure how to feel about Getaway.
I’m also aware that the deal with IDW and Hasbro was slowly ending so the stories had to be wrapped up. So they just had to make him one note. They didn’t have enough time but they could have tired.
I’m gonna end this all off here.
I just want to see content that isn’t just ‘GeTaWaY iS pUrE eViL’ or ‘GeTaWaY tHe AbUsIvE PaRtNeR’ or some other crap.
Because people avoid talking about Getaway after his character was assassinated. People who are fans of him I don’t see speak about him or if they do it can rarely find them.
But I’ve been aware that a of lot people are starting to speak out about Getaway’s mistreatment in the fandom. Which is better than having to stay quiet.
