Add an "R" for less brand confusion!
Enter Predaco- er...PREDACRON in issue # 34 of Void Rivals! Void Rivals is Robert Kirkman's sci-fi comic that tells the tale of two crumbling planets linked by a "Sacred Ring" (it's not Halo), their peoples at war for generations. When a member of each culture are stranded together, the two find they must put aside their differences if they want to survive. This story takes place in the so-called "Energon Universe", Skybound Entertainment's initiative to relaunch properties like Transformers and G.I. Joe within a shared universe that also happens to include the original characters and setting of Void Rivals.
In this thirty-fourth issue, Darak and Solila, along with their acquaintances in Cobra-La and their new ally ROM the Spaceknight are attacked by alien bounty hunter Predacron! Also on the way to the main plot; SKUXXOID!
Preda...cron?
Y'see, late in G.I. Joe's run, there was a sub-line called "Star Brigade" that featured a few Lunartix alien creatures, one of which was Predacon (an arm wrestler/bounty hunter from The Badlands, planet Trilenium). The name "Predacon" had been already used by Hasbro for their Transformers characters, the Predacons, and would be used again as the name of another faction of Transformers in Beast Wars. Since the name Predacon is now exclusively tied to Transformers in most people's minds, Kirkman decides here that a little differentiation is required, and thus we get Preda-CRON making his debut in this issue!
The entire issue is a fight with Predacron as he arrives to claim a bounty on ROM. Kirkman and Conor Hughes do well with action scenes as usual, and Kirkman seems intent on making Predacron "a thing". In fact, his quirky personality and tendency to add the words "yes, yes" into dialogue calls to mind a certain other bounty... er, Freelance Peacekeeping Agent closely associated with the Transformers. Of course, Death's Head is firmly a Marvel character now, but Predacron seems like Kirkman picking an obscure Hasbro character to fill his role in the Energon Universe. Honestly I'm shocked he didn't introduce Devcon yet...
So just a fight scene?
More or less, and there's a casualty as Predacron claims a victim among our band of protagonists! The other major thing, as mentioned, is that Skuxxoid finally reunites with Darak and Solila after nearly 30 issues! Kirkman's been having Skuxxoid off on his own sub-plot since the first arc, and now he gets to be folded into the main plot again!
There's some nice character interaction among the fighting, and Darak and Solila continue to get more comfortable with each other. Kirkman does seem to be merging various plot streams together now, so I wonder where his next major turning point will take us.
Cube?
Another solid instalment, even if it is almost entirely a fight scene. Conor Hughes' art is great as always and I enjoyed Kirkman's introduction of Predacron and just using a character that has had almost zero fiction in the past. I wish he did that more often in Transformers, really.
Buy Void Rivals # 34 this week, yes, yes?
