Review: ‘Transformers Beast Wars’ #16 Rages On
by Benjamin Hall
Summary
The alliance between the Maximals and Predacons helps form defenses against the Vok. However, the Voks’ deadline grows closer. Will the reluctant allies be able to stop the Vok? Or will the end of the Beast Wars mean the end of these Cybertronians?
Overall
7/10Writer Erik Burnham creates a strong script for this issue. The biggest strengths are the dialogue and characterization. Both result in various moments where the characters sound like individuals. Also, with the possible exception of one piece of dialogue, there are no problems with the verbal characterization. Not to mention that Burnham excellently grows the seed of a past plot point in the eleventh hour.
Artist Josh Burcham shows slight improvement when it comes to facial expressions and line work. Also the line work seems to be more confident.
Letterers Jake Wood and Nathan Widick do a very good job with the text. The placements are for the most part on point. Though one bit of text that gives a location is not in a great position it is not too intrusive. While the balloons are usually correct in size there are a few instances where they a bit too large. However, Wood and Widick do fine with the suggestion of vocal volumes via the sizes of the text.
Cover A features the work of artist Emilio Lopez. It is arguably the best of the three covers. This is mainly due to the color palette and proportions. The former enhances the realistic aspects of the art. While the latter is one of the realistic aspects of this work. Not to mention the line work seems very confident. However, the perspective being a bit askew does lower the quality level by a tiny degree.
Artist Anthony Pugh creates some nice speed lines on Cover B. Arguably it is the second best of the covers. Though the design may not be to the taste of others due to it almost looking like a trading card. This debatable flaw is due to the imminent clash occurring with a splash of color for a background. Despite this possible problem the quality is still relatively high.
Cover RI is by artist Sebastian Stone. It features art that would probably work as a tattoo. As a cover it seems more like Stone is repurposing a non-fungible token, or what most know as an NFT. The character is presumably Megatron, but looks like it could be an entirely made-up character. Subjectively this is the worst cover for this issue, and possibly the entire series.
Transformers Beast Wars #16 is out now from IDW Publishing.