THE TRANSFORMERS issue #30 is entitled "The Cure!" and was printed on April 14, 1987 with a pull date of July 1987. It's the conclusion to the two-issue Scraplets story arc, though it does contain elements that lead directly into issue #31 as well.  It features the same creative team as last issue—Budiansky as writer, Perlin as penciler, Akin & Garvey as inkers, Chiang doing the lettering, and Yomtov coloring the art.  

The Herb Trimpe cover showcases the Throttlebots battling a Scraplets monster made up of nuts and bolts, so it sort of spoils the big surprise in the story.  (It's also colored differently, since it's pink in the interior pages, but blue on the cover.  The Throttlebots are colored kind of oddly as well, with Freeway in dark blue and Chase-or-somebody in a weird red-and-purple color scheme.)

We're getting to the point in Transformers history where the televised cartoon series was running out of steam.  At this point in 1987, season three had finished airing in March with "The Return of Optimus Prime" parts 1 and 2. The final three episodes of the cartoon, which constituted the entirety of season four, would air in November of that year.  So, while the cartoon still beat the comics to the punch when it came to introducing the Throttlebots, the bulk of the 1987 toys would appear in Marvel Comics in the HEADMASTERS mini-series before they were ever seen on TV.  The Headmasters and Targetmasters would also be the last toys featured in the cartoon, so everybody introduced in the comics from this point forward (the Powermasters, the Pretenders, etc.) had no cartoon media equivalent in the USA.  It represents a real turning point, as Marvel Comics would be the only place to see these characters brought to life in stories, at least for American audiences.

Our story begins on Cybertron, where a group of five Autobot freedom fighters called the Throttlebots, led by Rollbar, are raiding a Decepticon fuel storage depot. They are significantly outclassed by the arrival of a Decepticn titanium-class destruction drone and are compelled to surrender.  They're taken to see Ratbat, who instead of destroying them is planning to force them into servitude to carry out a mission for him.  As seen last issue, the Decepticon Triple Changers were sent to Earth to intercept a Decepticon freighter shipment, but were infected with the scraplets disease carried by the freighter.  Rather than risk the infection spreading beyond Earth, Ratbat orders Rollbar and his crew to go to Earth and destroy everyone who is infected and contain the disease.  (Poor Triple Changers.  They were only introduced one issue ago, and from all outward indications, it looks like Budiansky is already going to kill them off!)

The designs of the Throttlebots are interesting.  Wide Load is consistently drawn as being significantly larger than the others, which I suppose makes sense on some level, since he's a construction dump truck and the others are all cars.  But, all the Throttlebot toys were the same size as each other, so it strikes me as weird.  Also, the designs for Chase and Searchlight seem to have gotten mixed up.  In the cartoon series, Chase (red) was usually drawn with Searchlight's head, while Searchlight (white) was drawn with Chase's head.  Somebody at Marvel Comics must have noticed the error, and attempted to correct it by coloring Chase white (Searchlight colors) and coloring Searchlight red (in Chase colors).  We don't see all of them transform in this issue, but when they're in car mode, Chase and Searchlight tend to adopt their normal colors (red for Chase and white for Searchlight).  It's kind of a mess.  Their TRANSFORMERS UNIVERSE profiles remain just about the only place in Marvel Comics where they're actually colored correctly!

Related to this, Goldbug's design is still evolving.  In the pages of TRANSFORMERS, he first started out looking like Bumblebee with a different head, until he gradually adopted pieces of the Throttlebot body design.  By this issue, he still looks like Bumblebee in car mode, but he's fully adopted the Throttlebot body design by this issue.  It's the original look he enjoyed in G.I. JOE AND THE TRANSFORMERS, but for some reason slipped back into a Bumblebee look afterwards.  It's all very strange.  Of course, this completely ignores the fact that the Goldbug toy was marketed as a Throttlebot, and his character model shares all the same design features as the other Throttlebots (double wheels embedded in his feet, backpack trunk, etc.) and yet he's treated as being completely separate from the rest of the group, with no relation to them despite looking identical to them. Funny how this happened in the cartoon, too.

Elsewhere, Charlie Fong is pushing a delapidated and infected Goldbug across the desert when they finally reach a service station.  The station attendants (Jim and Ernie) offer Charlie some water, which he accidentally spills on Goldbug. The water has the surprising effect of knocking the scraplets off Goldbug's exterior, instantly killing them.  He realizes that water must be the mysterious, forgotten miracle cure.  He tries to get more to rid Goldbug of his scraplets infection completely, but water is rare in the desert and the station attendants, understandably, don't want him wasting it on a car wash.  

Then we get a flashback to ninety minutes earlier, during which the Throttlebots arrive on Earth via space bridge, armed with acid canisters, intent on destroying the Triple Changers and anything else inside the crater.  The Decepticons (with a captive Blaster in chains) observe the Throttlebots surrounding the crater and try to mount an response, but they're too weakened by the disease, and Blitzwing crashes.  Some Scraplets dislodge themselves from Blitzwing, sensing the arrival of new robots.  They're kind of cute, honestly, and they even get distinctive little word shaped like triangles and hexagons and things. Shaped like nuts and bolts, you know?  It's adorable.

When Chase takes note of the tracks leading out of the crater, Rollbar and Wide Load realize whoever left them was probably infected, and they follow the trail.  Ratbat has, conveniently, given then Earth modes at some point off-panel in order to handle the terrain.  (It's clunky exposition, to be sure, but it would have been an oversight if somebody didn't at least mention it.)

The action picks up again ninety-three minutes later, as the Throttlebots catch up to Goldbug, in vehicle mode, and attempt to destroy him.  A timely warning from Charlie Fong enables Goldbug to change to robot mode and leap out of the way just in time.  (This doesn't exactly track with the dialogue, though.  Rollbar exclaims, "He transformed and rolled away!" when it's pretty obvious from the visuals that he, in fact, transformed and jumped out of the way.)

Rollbar is kind of vicious in this story.  He's supposed to be a good guy—he's only working for Ratbat because he's been forced to—and yet he's spouting lines like, "Look, Autobot, nothing personal, but your program has run its course" and whacks Goldbug with a support beam from the service station.  Charlie picks up some Scraplets knocked loose from Goldbug and throws them onto Wide Load, who protests loudly.  Then Charlie throws a bucket of soapy water on him, thus demonstrating there is a cure for the infection.  When Charlie explains that it's called water, none of the Throttlebots have ever heard of the stuff, proposing that it probably doesn't exist on Cybertron.

This honestly seems kind of strange, given that water is one of the most common naturally-occurring substances.  Granted, Cybertron is a technological planet, and it makes sense for them not to have a lot of water (all the Transformers would rust), but at the same time, Bumblebee mentions way back in issue #1 that he hopes Earth has water because he loves to swim.  For the Throttlebots (and, by extension, Ratbat and the Triple Changers and pretty much all the Transformers except Bumblebee) to have never heard of water before seems a bit daft.  (And we actually do see water on Cybertron later on, in issue #61.)

There's a word bubble mistake.  On page 12, Goldbug says, "Thank you...." and finishes up on page 13 with, "...Charlie Fong," but his dialogue balloon is connected to Wide Load's when he says, "Sorry I tried to slag you a few minutes ago," which means that either Wide Load was completing Goldbug's sentence, or Goldbug is apologizing to the Throttlebots for something he didn't do.  

Goldbug calls up Blackrock at his corporate headquarters (there's an amusing moment when his secretary mistakes the call as coming from a "Mister Goldberg" before correcting herself) and asks him to send them some water.  Blackrock arrives himself aboard one of two tanker trucks filled with the rare and exotic cure.  Goldbug shouts down to Blaster that they're going to spray the cure on the crater, but Blaster won't hear of it. He'd rather die than watch the Triple Changers be cured, and he demands that the Throttlebots destroy all of them with the acid instead.  Meanwhile, the Scraplets seem to be coalescing together.  With time running out, Goldbug wistfully commands the Throttlebots to release the acid.  

Incidentally, I love this moment, not just because of the great pathos, but because of the way Akin & Garvey emphasize the characters in the foreground with dark, heavy shading while distinguishing the background characters with lighter pen strokes.  They do it both when Blaster is shouting at Goldbug with Octane and Astrotrain and Blitzwing standing behind him, and again when Goldbug is in the foreground with Wide Load and Chase behind him.  Visually, it's very interesting.

> Our story begins on Cybertron, where a group of five Autobot freedom fighters called the Throttlebots, led by Rollbar, are raiding a Decepticon fuel storage depot. They are significantly outclassed by the arrival of a Decepticn titanium-class destruction drone and are compelled to surrender. They're taken to see Ratbat, who instead of destroying them is planning to force them into servitude to carry out a mission for him.

Budiansky definitely went his own way with his stories compared to the cartoon, and one of his choices I really like was the decision to make Ratbat the leader of the Decepticons.

In the comics and cartoon worlds, generally speaking, might makes right. Optimus and Megatron are among the most powerful warriors on each team. The Matrix goes to Ultra Magnus, then gives little Hot Rod a power up so he can become a Prime. It's like giving a shot of steroids to whoever wins the Presidential election. ("Congratulations, Mr. President-elect. If you'll just bend over and let us inject this Winstrol right there...")

The idea that some sniveling, fuel-obsessed accountant might connive his way to the top of a gang that respects power is powerfully subversive, and shows a wholly different face of evil than we're used to. In real life, of course, we know that bean-counters and their ilk are heroic and wonderful people to be admired and emulated.
>
> This honestly seems kind of strange, given that water is one of the most common naturally-occurring substances. Granted, Cybertron is a technological planet, and it makes sense for them not to have a lot of water (all the Transformers would rust)

Not if they have Corrostop!

> And, yes, next issue is "Buster Witwicky and the Car Wash of Doom!" Let that sink in.

"Jessie's a friend...you know she's been a good friend of mine..."

> Zob (how the hell is it only ten days until Christmas, when Thanksgiving was yesterday, I think, and Halloween was only about a week ago?!)

Happy Kwanzaa, Zob.

On Friday, December 16, 2022 at 11:13:11 AM UTC-8, Codigo Postal wrote:
> > Our story begins on Cybertron, where a group of five Autobot freedom fighters called the Throttlebots, led by Rollbar, are raiding a Decepticon fuel storage depot. They are significantly outclassed by the arrival of a Decepticn titanium-class destruction drone and are compelled to surrender. They're taken to see Ratbat, who instead of destroying them is planning to force them into servitude to carry out a mission for him.
> Budiansky definitely went his own way with his stories compared to the cartoon, and one of his choices I really like was the decision to make Ratbat the leader of the Decepticons.
>
> In the comics and cartoon worlds, generally speaking, might makes right. Optimus and Megatron are among the most powerful warriors on each team. The Matrix goes to Ultra Magnus, then gives little Hot Rod a power up so he can become a Prime. It's like giving a shot of steroids to whoever wins the Presidential election. ("Congratulations, Mr. President-elect. If you'll just bend over and let us inject this Winstrol right there...")
>
> The idea that some sniveling, fuel-obsessed accountant might connive his way to the top of a gang that respects power is powerfully subversive, and shows a wholly different face of evil than we're used to. In real life, of course, we know that bean-counters and their ilk are heroic and wonderful people to be admired and emulated.
> >
> > This honestly seems kind of strange, given that water is one of the most common naturally-occurring substances. Granted, Cybertron is a technological planet, and it makes sense for them not to have a lot of water (all the Transformers would rust)
> Not if they have Corrostop!
> > And, yes, next issue is "Buster Witwicky and the Car Wash of Doom!" Let that sink in.
> "Jessie's a friend...you know she's been a good friend of mine..."
> > Zob (how the hell is it only ten days until Christmas, when Thanksgiving was yesterday, I think, and Halloween was only about a week ago?!)
> Happy Kwanzaa, Zob.

This was a great review, Zob, and some great comments from Codigo, too. Thanks for bringing these comics to life so vividly, so many years later.

Wishing everyone a Happy New Year!

JB