The return of Sarracini

[TrypticOwen]

Hi there.

Dreamwave have recently announced a bit of a shake up of their Transformers writing/drawing roles.

Most notably Sarracini is taking over from McDonough/Patyk on G1.

In other news, Pat Lee is returning as artist on G1. Figueroa/Furman on Beast Wars.

I think it's good news for Beast Wars, there's no doubt about it.

I think Pat Lee's style is kinda cool so I'm not fussed (as many fans might be) by his return to G1.

My big concern is the G1 writing. I have little concern over Sarracini's ability as a writer: G1 vol. 1 was probably the best _story_ in the Dreamwave G1 series. My concerns centre on his Transformers credentials: I thought his characterisation of the TFs in vol. 1 was extremely poor (to the extent that these iconic charcaters seemed unfamiliar to me - and I grew up with them!) particularly the 'prime directive' plot point which suggested that TFs were simple machines and not truly alive as we know them to be. I'm also concerned since McDonough had set up lots of big story arcs in his G1 work (he once said, in an interview, that he had 3 to 4 years of TF stuff ready). Will these story arcs be adequately resolved? In spite of my opinions of McDonough's early writing (which really was mostly centred on poor dialogue more than anything else), I've got into his TF universe and want to know how it's all gonna tie up and work out.

Lastly, why not Furman? I think he'd much rather write for G1 than Beast Wars (in spite of how excellent Beast Wars was). I'd certainly much rather have him there.

Maybe I'm worrying over nothing but I find this all very troubling...

What do the rest of you think?

[GeO]

Wow, where'd you hear that? I didn't know McDonough/Mick was out and Sarracini was back in, or are these just rumors?
Well, I liked the first TF Volume by Sarracini because to me it really felt like it was filling in some of the missing (almost 20) years between the end of the G1 TV series season 2 and the start of the movie/season 3. That's always been one of the biggest questions/gaps in TF mythos...the TV followed the first couple years of Transformers on earth and then suddenly skipped ahead 20 years to where the Decepticons conquered Cybertron, Spike had a pre-pubescent son and his dad (Sparkplug) was awol. You can't tell me nothing important happened in those 2 decades LOL:p :rolleyes: :D!

Volume 2 kinda screwed that over with me because they established their own seperate continuity in a way that kind of pissed on that warm fuzzy feeling I got thinking that these were the "lost decades stories" from my childhood LOL:D. Had they just kept out the whole angle with Shockwave and the new Transformers JUST NOW making contact with the earth crews, it could've still applied:confused:. That being said I still loved how they introduced Ultra Magnus and the season 3 guys like HotRod, Kup, Blurr, Arcee, Springer.

Back to Vol 1 though, I thought the Ark 2 storyline/Sparkplug's death and the tidbit about the war where all of earth's military/Autobots united against the Decepticons was great and it worked as a way of writing them out for several years...once again filling in that near 20 year gap of no stories from the TV mythos. I agree though, we may be in for another awkward transition. I'd assume Sarracini will have his own stories and direction when he takes over from McDonough...much like McDonough went his own way after taking over from Sarracini.

Isn't McDonough writing BeastWars though? My understanding was that Furman is staying on with Energon/Cybertron and WarWithin while McDonough is doing BeastWars as he's also a big fan of that series?

In a way Furman is still writing for G1 with WarWithin, plus he did his G1 and G2 stories back in the day. I think it's only fair to give some other people their time in the spotlight, get some new perspective rather than be glued to certain concepts like Primus origins as a comic thing and Quintessons as a TV thing. I like that they're mixing things up now.

[GeO]

I visited a few websites (Dreamwave, Tformers.com) and yeah, you are right! McDonough/Mick and Patyk have left the company over what in part seems to be a money issuehttp://tformers.com/article.php?sid=3842 . Man, is Furman their go-to guy or what? The man's doing 3 TF series now!

[Blacknife]

I'll grant Sarracini is an average writer, but in no way shape or form do I believe he should be given the complete blame for G1v1.
I believe Lee had a major influence, if not using Sarracini as some shadow.

You can even tell the difference between Armada and G1.

[TrypticOwen]

I completely agree about liking the fact that vol. 1 fitted nicley between the 80s-set TF stories and the movie.

It could also have fitted into the UK Marvel alternate timeline (again between the eighties stuff and TF:TM).

I didn't think vol. 1 was a bad story and I don't think that Sarracini is a bad writer. Quite the opposite, in fact.

My issues with vol. 1/Sarracini revolved around the TFs as characters (and to a certain extent, as a species) being portrayed very differently to their established characters (and background). It seemed like he knew how to write but had only a passing familiarity with the licensed property he was working with.

I, too, didn't appreciate the backtracking of vol. 2 nor did I particularly like its story. However, vol. 3 of the McDonough/Patyk continuity was starting to get interesting...

My fear, now, is: what will happen to the McDonough/Patyk continuity? Does Sarracini know where they were going with it? Will we see how Earth's special place in their continuity pans out? Will the big Unicron/Quintesson story pan out as it was intended?

Or will they forget about the McDonough/Patyk continuity and return to the Sarracini middle years stuff? Sarracini's vol. 2 preview (included in, for example, the vol. 1 TPB) was clearly not a preview to the story that McDonough told. Will Sarracini forget about what McDonough/Patyk did in the same way that McDonough rather unceremoniously forgot about vol.1? Will Sarracini tell the story that he was going to tell in vol. 2? If so, that would be a lot of messing about with the continuity for us fans to swallow. Not that I think it would be bad to let Sarracini tell the story he had in mind - based on the evidence of vol. 1 it would have been quite good.

I quite like the Dreamwave stuff so all these rumours are concerning. McDonough/Patyk left because they weren't being paid (apparently). The sales of G1 have been dropping - is Dreamwave in financial trouble?

The change of writers on Beast Wars is hardly a bad thing - Furman's the man! Coupled with the fact that he wrote an episode for the Beast Wars cartoon and was going to write more stories had the cartoon not ended (to make way for Beast Machines), this makes him an ideal choice.

The shake-up on the GI Joe crossover doesn't bother me that much because I'm not that bothered by it.

The future of the G1 story, however, does concern me...