Energon Volume 4

« Transformers: Energon Volume 4 « Transformers: Super Link Volume 3
Publisher	Hasbro
First published	June 24, 2004
Manga	Naoto Tsushima
Story	Aaron Archer (English ver.)

Optimus Prime finds some magic mushroom.

Synopsis

The Autobots and Decepticons had been locked in an epic war until energon was discovered on Earth. Now both sides fight for control, and the Powerlinx Battles have begun!

Optimus Prime and Hot Shot are down, with Megatron, Snow Cat, Mirage, Demolishor, and Shockblast all standing ready to finish them. But just as all seems lost, Wing Saber arrives, combining with Optimus Prime. The pair blows away the Decepticons, then switches to flight mode as Megatron attacks from the air. Megatron is shocked that his foe can fly now, but Prime informs him that "with teamwork, you can do anything Megatron." [sic]

Optimus Prime speculates that Wing Saber will enable them to protect the area's energon.

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Notes

It's not Dreamwave, but we don't hear anybody complaining.

• As Dreamwave was well on the road to total meltdown by this point, rather than having a Dreamwave-produced comic, this volume was instead an original manga produced by Japanese artist Naoto Tsushima who previously worked on "Optimus Prime VS Scourge", another Super Link pack-in manga. This volume also saw release in the third Super Link toy pack-in catalogue, packed-in with figures from the tail-end of the line.
  • Presumably, in Japanese markets, this volume is meant to be a pseudo tie-in to the Japanese cartoon continuity much like "Optimus Prime VS Scourge", while the English version would presumably be considered a part of the same universe as the previous Dreamwave-produced mini-comic volumes. Yeah, it's another one of those situations. If this comic takes place in cartoon continuity, it would have to take place at some point between "Imprisoned Inferno" and "Omega Supreme", but one would have to ignore the introductory page, as Constructicon Maximus is not active in Energon till after Shockblast is dead.
• When the comic was imported by Hasbro, they did not receive any translation for the script, leading Aaron Archer to look at the artwork and write the dialogue from scratch to roughly fit.^[1]
• Initially, the cover artwork for this comic/booklet was to be of Optimus Prime (combined with Wing Saber) fighting Galvatron by Guido Guidi.^[2] It's possible Guidi's unused cover art was intended for a Dreamwave-produced version of the Volume 4 mini-comic, before the company imploded and Hasbro decided to use Naoto Tsushima's comic.
• The flip half of the booklet features a catalog of Energon toys, including the three combiner teams and the various larger-sized late-run redecos.
• This mini-comic was also available as a "Conventions 2004 Exclusive Mini Comic" in a larger format, paired with the Volume 3 catalog. The convention version featured a fold-out front cover with conceptual design sketches of various Energon toys. The actual comic was missing the first introductory page, however.

References