Transformers: The Complete All Hail Megatron Hardcover – August 9, 2011

I have been a fan of Transformers since I started watching the G1 cartoons and reading the G1 comics when I was a little girl, I have however never read any of the IDW comics before I bought this one, I thought a book that collected an entire story arc would be a good place to start and I was right. I mention that I have not read any of the other IDW stories to point out that while there are references in this to earlier events usually there is no problem reading this story even if you have not read anything else from IDW's new G1 setting. I would say however that you should be familiar with G1 Transformers as nothing about the setting is really explained, but if you have read some of the old 1980's comics or seen the cartoon then you should have no problems following the story of this book. I think however that you will get more enjoyment of it if you read the start of the IDW stories first as there is a few places where things happen that do not make sense unless you have read the earlier material, but for the most part the story is easy to get into.This book is about the Decepticons going on an all out attack on Earth. Cybertron have become uninhabitable and or favorite bad guys need a new place to call home base, I am not going to spoil any of the plot but I have to say it is refreshing to see the bad guys win, that bring something to the setting, a sense of there being actual stakes in the game, that the good guys do not just win by default. Another thing I love in this book is that the Autobots are shown with flaws, it is shown that even for giant robots war takes it's toll.Now on thing I should note is that this book is pretty dark and it is extremely violent, unlike in the cartoons the Decepticons kill people and while blood and guts are not shown, the descriptions can be bad enough. Basically when a army of 30 foot robots go on a rampage in New York city people are going to die and this comic book actually manages to be chilling at times, as for example when Skywarp go off to China to have fun and calmly explain how he just killed half the population of a local village but that was just not so entertaining when Thundercraker would not join in, or when Franzy attack a group of soldiers with his drills. Yes in the original G1 on rare occasions someone got hurt or died, and certainly some of the Decepticon plans if they has succeeded would have led to quite a few deaths, however in general the robots only did damage to one another and human death where just not addresses, but it is here and in quite a brutal way. In addition the wounds the robots themselves get is portrayed more, brutally if you will, there are scenes of graphic torture and themes such as suicide is discussed. All Hail Megatron is very dark, and I am not saying this is bad, on the contrary to an adult reader this give the comic a gritty realism which make the stories even better, however I do not think this book is suitable for young children, it might be about giant robots, but it is for adults.The art in this comic is amazing, the colors pop, the character designs is perfect and there is just so much detail, I could just stare at each page noticing ever more little details and all of that helped to suck me into the story. I also love that they detail out some of how these robots live, how they think and their daily life, that help actual give depth to them. This book is quality from the front cover to the last page.Now no product is perfect and I do have a few gripes with this. One problem is that at times the story felt a little bit rushed and transitions between scenes where a bit strange. Let me give you and example. Soundwave, the Decepticon communications officer block all signals to and from new York City to prevent the humans trapped in the city to call for help Now Soundwave have a symbiotic relationship with several smaller robots which turn into micro cassettes and lives in is chest when not in use, and he have been shown to be very protective of his cassette minions. Anyway some of the human character come across Rumble, one of the cassettes and shoot him in the face. Soundwave feeling his cassette minion being hurt comes running and lifts the fallen Rumble up, cradle him in his arms and begin to emit this horrid sound that fill the area and he also becomes so upset he looses control of jamming communications to and from the city allowing the humans to call out. Now this is a powerful scene, actually showing that Decepticons have feelings to, even Soundwave, the problem is that Rumble is right there fighting on Megatron's side in the next scene. I mean what happened? It is not like one of the cassettes have never been wounded before, Soundwave did not go apes**it over that. By Soundwave's reaction you would think Rumble was dead or at lead very badly hurt, but no, he apparently was fine so why did the most emotionless of the Decepticons lose complete control if Rumble was only slightly hurt. Also if Sounwave cares so much for his cassettes that even slight damage to them make him lose control, why where he then fine with abandoning Ravage and Laserbeak on Earth a little later in the story. Now the above is just one example but at times it seams IDW had to cut their page count down and ended up cutting away some crucial elements which would give explanations and make scenes, like the one with Soundwave make sense.Another issue I have with this book is the scale of the robots. In original G1 an average hight human man would stand just shot of reaching a large robot like Optimus Prime or Megatron to their knees. Yes there where scaling errors now and again bit that where the general idea. A leader size Transformer was about 9 to 10 meters tall or about 30 feet, in the IDW G1 continuity they seam to have followed about the same scale, the problem is that all through All Hail Megatron the robots are enormous. In one scene Soundwave walk past a window in a mall and with the scale of the window and the human beings standing next to it a human being she it stood on Soundwave's shoulder would not reach to the top of his head, the Autobots however are normal G1 scale compared to human beings, but are the same size as the Decepticons when they fight them. Now I know this is done to make the bad guys more menacing, but it is stupid it just break with suspense of disbelief. Yes the Decepticons run around destroying cities, that do not mean they have to be the size of Godzilla.Now a final complaint before I go back to praising this book for how awesome it is. Now this is a heavy book, this is not really the product's fault, but the thing get cumbersome to read at times, also the pages are so glossy and I do not know what they have used to create the gloss effect but it picks up fingerprints like you would not believe. You know the glossy, piano black Playstation 3 consoles? Yes the pages of this book pick up fingerprints just as badly as that do, perhaps even more, this is not a huge concern, but it is a bit annoying.Except for a very few complaints I have nothing but good to say about All Hail Megatron. The main story is amazing and most of the one shot stories included in the book is very good as well. This is a great place to start getting into IDW Transformers and I had allot of enjoyment reading this book, also this book is huge, I do not care how fast you read comic books, it will take you a while to get though this. All Hail Megatron is beautiful, dark and exiting and it have definitely wet my appetite for more books in this series.Now since the Amazon page do not say, here is the content of All Hail Megatron.*All Hail Megatron (Complete)*Old Ways (Short Story)*Uneasy Lies The Head (Short Story)*Replay (Short Story)*Rebirth (Short Story)*Everything In Its Right Place (Short Story)*Lost and Found (Short Story)*The Man Of Steel (Short Story)*Hidden (Short Story)*Spotlight Blurr*Spotlight Jazz*Spotlight Cliffjumper*Spotlight Drift*Spotlight Metroplex*An art gallery containing cover art for various issues and some character concept art. In addition there are a foreword by the story author, all in all a good collection of material.

IDW puts together a splendid hardbound collection of the entire All Hail Megatron series plus the 4 part Coda aftermath and adds in a few of the spotlight one shot comics. The basis premiss of this story is "what happens when the bad guys win?" It's a fantastic read however as a fan of IDW I'm a little curious as to why they released this book right before releasing Volume 5 of their all encompassing collection series. The nice addition to this hardbound book is that you get a gallery of all the covers released for each comic book of the series, as well as some additional art work in the back of the book. If you're like me and have Volumes 1-4 of the Collection series, skip this set and order Volume 5. The spotlights in the back of this book have already been covered in volumes 1-4 and those are the order they're meant to be read. It's a nice book but I don't think it was worth more than the upcoming Volume 5. IDW was just being a little greedy, but they're a company so I can't really blame for for double dipping the fan base.

It came in perfectly good shape, but some of the pages did start falling out. This could have just been the way I was holding it. I also noticed there were some marks on the front of it? Blink and you miss it unless you look hard enough. I’m guessing something got dragged on top of it before it was shipped out. Otherwise this was very readable and in almost mint condition.

By more recent IDW standards, this main storyline is just OK. Also, half the books in this volume are little one-off stories ("spotlights"). I'm probably working a bit backward through IDW, having read the MTMTE series and continuing forward from there (Lost Light, Optimus Prime, etc), and going back to take a look at these books now. It's just not up to the same standard. Also, I just read the Autocracy book and it's 10 times better, so tough to follow.It's a huge book. A big collection. About half the book accumulates issues 1-13 or so that tell a comprehensive story of Megatron trying to take over the earth. The other half are these one-off stories, not related to that main storyline, or these character "spotlights" which are fun little reads, but don't add much in terms of packing them up with the first half the book.It was an OK pickup for the Amazon price around $30.

All Hail Megatron is one of the greatest Transformers comic stories ever written. Not only does it show what would happen if the Decepticons would do if they won it all, but what would happen to the Autobots if they lost it all.Like all stories that have the villiains winning it all, it fleshes the characters we love to hate more. Providing more depth to them than just the boogey man under the bed. We get to see Megatron as a calculated leader, always one step ahead of the rest of the Decpticons.The art in the book reminds me of the old G1 cartoons back in the day and does great work in doing so. The writing is character driven and makes me really feel for all the characters. I recommend this for any G1 Transformers fan.

A normal omnibus can be finished on an hours lunch. Not the case with this beast. This is a full weekend's read for me, including time to appreciate the gorgeous art work.Unfortunately my copy arrived with some damage so I have to be careful with reading it. That aside, this is a must own.

The material is well presented in this large hardcover book. A reading ribbon is attached to the spine to mark you place. In addition to the All Hail Megatron Maxi-series and coda, there are several Transformer Spotlight issues integrated in this book. The main storyline is printed in the order of the original publication, the spotlight issues are not published in chronological order. I am not sure why this is not the case, however I will not complain about this fact because I was not aware these extra issues were included in the book. I deducted one star from this item strictly of the heft of the book.

Great artwork, and some rather striking violence for a transformers story - very little blood but there are clearly hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of human deaths taking place as the Decepticons achieve near total victory on Earth. But the story is a bit humdrum and the dialogue contains macho cliches aplenty and doesn't really go anywhere. And some, such as Prowl and especially Starscream are inconsistently written and act totally out of character.Last Stand of the Wreckers' crown as IDW's top transformers story remains safe.

Great artwork and there is a lot included in the 'Complete' book. You get the main story and spin offs explaining the impact of what has transpired.Highly recommended.

Its a great book glad I got it cant wait for the next book in the series awesome stuff buy it now

Would recommend!

i ordered this twice and both times the book had been torn apart. the story is good but this product is complete crap