This volume starts off on some high notes, and, well, ends on them, too.   (It's just the first high notes don't make me cry and shake in anger.)

From a mission gone wrong, to one of the fluffiest pieces in which you see some of the crew have a day off in Hedonia, to the Overlord arc, in which the aftereffects have yet to be fully realized, this is a fantastic volume.   It's all brilliant, and makes me wonderfully happy, while being a slight let down from the previous volume.   As I called before, there's just not much that can match the perfectness and awe-inspiring end to volume 3.  

The beauty of this volume is how much it tries, and how it makes that effort seem effortless.   It tears you through joy, and heartbreak, and rage; it ranges from deadly serious to ridiculously funny.   It runs the whole gamut, and you enjoy every single second, every single brilliant second.   It cuts through the pain with humor, and makes serious points even when funny. 

The prose story is far superior to Eugenesis - clean cut, to the point, and as heartbreakingly funny and seriously funny as the graphic novel.   It's four pages at the end called Signal to the Noise.  It uses humor in the same way, and has the same characterizations that Roberts brings to life along with the various artists he's worked with on this series. 

In the end, this is all about what people do with themselves after a war they've been fighting for millions of years.   A civil war, and yeah, they've been fighting that long - not through generations, mind you, but they themselves have been fighting.   These are the lost, the vulnerable, the psychotic, the outcasts and outliers, the broken and all of them are trying to put things right and have their world make sense again.   It's a long, long journey and this is jus the start.   

The betrayed, the forgotten, the betrayers and the ones best forgotten: Roberts puts the painfully glaring spotlight on them all, and makes you laugh while they squirm, and squirm when they laugh.   If you chose to join them, be warned you will share their joys, and their pain, and they tend to go from the highest peak to the shallowest grave.   Roberts enjoys playing roller coaster with your emotions, toying you, and shocking you, and as much as you might want to protest that you don't like it, he does it so skillfully, so intelligently, with such care and sympathy, that you don't.   You can't, really.  

Although I will say this after reading through.   I stand by my statement that Rodimus is a horrible leader.   He's still too immature, and too much of a risk taker, and he's played with the crew's life since day one.   I understand why he's leading the Lost Light, why he's the captain: it's in his nature to rebel as he did, and to do so in such a flippant way that puts so many bots in danger.   I will, however, never forgive him for what's happened in this volume.   Never.   

I hate you, Rodimus.   Your stupid name just reflects your own inner stupidity.   I sincerely hope you go offline permanently.   Yes, I'm talking to a fictional character.   I don't care, because if he were in front of me now, I'd say that, watch him toss around his office, then try to hump him into stasis.   (I'm angry, not celibate.)

Although there is a pretty big continuity error.   Given how readily Magnus told Tailgate to relax in an earlier volume, I find it hard to believe that now Magnus doesn't believe relax is a word, or that he says he has to 'learn how to reflex' in this volume.   

Wow.   I just forgot how much I loved this collection.   It's five issues, and they are, somewhat, standalone stories that pull into one cohesive whole.   Kinda.   Each character takes a heave role: issues four and five are about mostly about Ratchet, and the back cover says six is mostly about Rodimus - although I think it's more about Max, and seven and eight are another min-arc that involves the crew of the W.A.P., and involves Grimlock.   

However, I would argue that there are two arcs - the first three issues and the second half is two that don't really do that heavy continuation of the first three.   So, Ratchet, and everyone who got Fisitron's blogs, all reporting on the Wreckers, get one posthumously.  Ratchet figures out that it's coming from Delphi, and not only that, it's telling them all that something wrong is going on at the Autobot Delphi medical unit.   That is, half of the patients are dying.   

Two mind-blowing issues are Ratchet trying to figure out what's going on, including him, Drift, and others almost dying of a rust virus.   But the real kick is at the end - and how Drift gets Ratchet a nifty new pair of hands, since Ratchet's hands were getting locked up and making him useless as a medic.   (And thus useless - the one thing Ratchet is good for - according to himself, at least - is being a medic.)   I must say, Ratch is not normally my favorite character, although in Prime and IDW-Verse, he's amazing.   He's also at his cranky best here - and he gets to show that he is good for a hell of a lot more than being a medic.   He not only figures out how to get the antidote to the virus, he's also the one who figures out how it works, and he's the one who follows First Aid's explanation to these conclusions.   He's crazy smart, and he's devious to boot - he fucks Pharma over good.   And Pharma deserved everything he got, and a whole lot more. 

But it's First Aid who gets Fortress Maximus into the mix.   This is especially important because the third issue in this volume is the one where Max takes hostages.   I'd argue it's more his story, of why and how he was driven by a bitter realization - how long it took Prowl to get help to Garrus-9 - that is driving him over the edge of reason.   It's about decisions Rodimus has to make, too, but I'd argue that the focus is on Max.  I'm guessing, though, that they didn't want to say this on the back cover as you're not supposed to know about Max then?

The DJD issue is the one that holds my interest least.   It's clever as always, but even now, it's fading from memory.  The problem is that I don't really care about these particular Decepticons, and I'm not sure why.   They're full characters: full of life, full of weaknesses and flaws, and, yes, even goodness - such as their loyalty to one another - and of course sexiness.   But I just don't care about them that much.  I didn't find their particular backstories as interesting as being on the Lost Light.  

You do get one page of Grimlock, and then he plays a pretty big role - despite not having much page time - in issue eight.   And I have the same issue with eight as I do with seven. It's just not as interesting to me when Grimlock, or the crew of the Lost Light isn't there.  And I know it was all Dinobot month, but... jeez.   That's a shitty reason to have this story that has, up until now, not been heard of again.   (I'm up to volume 5 in this, too.   It's either a really, really long game, or this story was as pointless as I think.   If it's the latter, then maybe the fact that this doesn't come into play again is what's making me yawn...)

Still, fabulous, and it works as two separate stories.   It does tie in, especially with the bits of the Lost Light crew that you see in the last two episodes. And there is the fact that Max was beaten to death, and lobotomized by Overlord, and he is mentioned as being on the D.J.D. - Decepticon Justice Division - radar.   So there is more tie-in than it would seem at first.   Still... I was so hoping Grimlock would have more speech bubbles, and time in the comic.   Especially disappointing that he doesn't show up again.   Argh. 

About Orion Pax: "At first he felt safe with the massive bulk of Ultra Magnus beside him..."   

Please, please turn porny.   OP/UM is a ship I wanna take a ride on. 

I knew it!  I knew that Ultra Magnus was too straight laced not to be super kinky.   Here are his hobbies, as described by Swerve.  Ultra Magnus has got his music - not to mention his *blacked out* and his frankly bizarre obsession with *blanked out* - which Ratchet swears can lead to premature death and, even worse, *blanked out.*"   The next panel says AUDIO SOUNDTRACK CENSORED BY ORDER OF THE DULY ELECTED ENFORCER OF THE TYREST ACCORD.

Guess who's duly elected?   Rodimus gave him the right to clear the documentary about the Lost Light's quest for the Knights of Cybertron.   DAMMIT, JAMES ROBERT!   DAMMIT TO HELL!

This is Magnus. 

This is how someone compliments him so he gives them a hug.   (DAMN THUNDERCLASH!  I WANT THE HUG!)  "I was already a huge fan of your work as Tyrest's most trusted.   And then I read your articles on the Autobot code - the one on typefaces.   Bravo sir - bravo.   I had considered myself an expert on the interrelationship between typography and military justice, but you took it so much further."   He's into rules and regulations.   He will imprison you if your badge is skewed.   You better be dwelling on the transitive verbs in the footnotes of the Autobot code, or he'll lecture you to death by boredom about it.   It makes no sense that I find him sexy, and yet... 

It's driving me nuts.   What do you think his possibly fatal, bizarre obsession is?   Help me, please.   Because I just want to think naughty, naughty things about this...   And all I can do is think, what is it?   What is it that you're so obsessed with?

No, really.   What the fuck, James Roberts.   I'm not sure how I feel about this.   I'm really not, because roller coaster.  Spoilers after the page break.