Transformers: Death of Optimus Prime One-Shot
Story by James Roberts, John Barbar
Art by Nick Roche
Colors by John Burcham
Letters by Shawn Lee
Covers by Vicktor Deak, Nick Roche, and Livio Ramondelli
IDW Publishing
Release Date: December 21, 2011
Cover Price: $3.99

Even though this book is titled Transformers: The Death of Optimus Prime, it should really almost be called Transformers #0. Why? It’s a launching point for IDW Publishing’s brand new direction of the Transformers franchise, and do they go out/start out with a bang! Writers James Roberts and John Barbar do a fantastic job of both closing up the previous Transformers storyline AND starting off a brand new direction for everyone’s favorite robots in disguise.

Honestly, I don’t know how hardcore Transformers fans are going to react to this. It’s VERY different from anything that we’ve seen before and it basically does away with everything that we’ve always known and loved about the mythology of the Transformers. I liked it quite a bit, but honestly, I can see “Transfans” not being happy with this. But, I recommend you give it a chance.

On the art side of things, Nick Roche does a SPECTACULAR job bringing the Transformers to life. There’s lots of new designs and new characters, and with Transformers, it’s easy to make them look similiar, but Roche succeeds in making everyone look unique. He also gets a chance to draw Cybertron in a whole new way, and hits a home run doing it. I look forward to his work on the upcoming Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye in a couple of weeks.

All in all, a pretty solid issue. If you’ve never read the Transformers comics, this is the issue you’ll want to pick up. And, if you’re a die-hard Transfan, you’ll want to pick this up as well. Very entertaining, lots of great art, and a couple of nice shocks and surprises thrown in for good measure.