I didn’t want to do a “followup” to Friday’s comic so soon because these topics always have a mentally-exhausting aftermath, and my inbox is already full of racists and I don’t really require any more at the moment, but regardless today’s strip had to happen.

Also, this weekend come meet me in public!  …

…

shit

Phoenix Comicon is next weekend!  I’ll be sharing a table with my Convention Wife Joel Watson.

I drew this one entirely on my sweet new Surface Pro!

Hey, everyone, let me introduce you to The Perfect Springer.  And, no, actually, it’s not because he’s a Triple Changer again for the first time in forever.  I mean, that’s nice.  I like that.  It’s cool.  But what makes him the super best is that he takes the bulk of his visuals from Nick Roche‘s Springer redesign for Last Stand of the Wreckers — which, you know, is an awesome story, because I keep telling you that it is.

I would have been happyish with a based-on-the-old-cartoon Triple Changer Springer.  But Last Stand of the Wreckers Springer?  That gets me instantly to climax.  It is Boner City over here.  In four hours I’m gonna have to call a doctor.

Admittedly, this particular rendition of LSOTW Springer is taller and thinner than how he was rendered in the story itself.  He was a wide mass of dude in that thing.  This toy is thinner than that, though still, you know, not being a stick.  It’s probably one of those sacrifices you gotta make because of physics, as this guy has two altmodes to transform into, and if you bulk up his legs you kind of end up with a fat car and helicopter.  His proportions do resemble more Roche’s original control art, versus Springer’s actual appearances.

There are some other changes to the design for this toy, but they’re ones I’m satisfied with.  Mostly, it’s that his altmodes look less made-up vehicle-y by a smidge.  Springer’s new car mode looks a lot more like a car versus a four-wheeled vehicle of some undetermined sort.

Let me tangent here: Man, what the hell was with original 1986 Springer’s toy, anyway?  I’m not sure that thing is a real Triple Changer.  It has a robot mode and it has an okayish helicopter mode, but his car mode is just the midtransformation step with the propeller removed.  It barely pretends to have rear wheels.  What an awful thing.  And how awesome is it that this new toy has three distinct modes that are all great?  I mean, even the shape of the windshield changes.  Looking at either vehicle mode, you couldn’t tell at a glance that it has a second one.

Springer doesn’t have any engineering hurdles like Blitzwing’s shoulders.  He’s, as I’ve been saying, pretty damn perfect.  The only part of the transformation that gave me pause was how to attach the gun under the cockpit in helicopter mode.  The instructions just give you an arrow and the words “ATTACH WEAPON.”  Well, yeah, great, but HOW?  Apparently there are some… notches?  I just kind of use excessive force and some shapes that look like they complement each other eventually snap together.

The propeller spins very satisfactorily.  And it transforms into a believable sword seamlessly.  It’s not that giant plank of wood on a peg the original toy had.  I’m impressed at the amount of articulation he has, too, despite the engineering demands.  He has a turning waist and even though his hands bury inside his own forearms while transformed, he still has articulated wrists.   Voyager Class is also the perfect size for a Springer — dude was larger than everyone else in the cartoon (he was Optimus Prime/Rodimus Prime’s height), and in the comic he wasn’t no shrimp.   So he’ll look right next to a Deluxe Hot Rod, Kup, or Blurr.

you will buy this

you will buy this now

The $27k milestone has passed, and that means you can go in and add Roomies! Book 2 to your pledges!

However, he goes pretty well with RTS Lugnut, and I think I care about that more.

This Blitzwing even has the same face-changey gimmick as the Animated Blitzwing.  (2008′s Animated Blitzwing is likely why it took from 2008 to 2013 to get a “Classics” Blitzwing.  They’re both Voyagers who are Blitzwing in Blitzwing colors who also Triple Change into a tank and a jet.  He is kind of redundant to this guy on many levels.)  I’m happy to see stuff from Animated stuffed into G1, rather than the other way around as it tended to.  And it’s not like Blitzwing loses anything by gaining this gimmick, mostly because there wasn’t much to him to begin with.

This toy really makes use of the complexity of the size class.  He’s huge and full of hinges.  This density of joints is absolutely fine except for at his shoulders.  They just don’t peg together well, and so if you try to rotate his shoulders around, his chest comes apart.  This is annoying and stupid.  There is a way to fix it that involves unscrewing the front and back halves of his torso and sanding down the connection points so that everything’s smashed together tighter in robot mode, but it sucks that you gotta do it.  I attempted  it, and it fixes it a little, but I think I need another pass or something.   If this weren’t a thing, there’d be little to complain about.

But yeah, he’s pretty damn complex.  Sure, you’d expect him to have wings that fold out, but he’s also got little extra wing contours that also fold out to create a more full and natural wing shape.  His jet cockpit opens.  His tank turret rotates.  Additional treads fold out from inside his legs.  Tank mode skin folds out from inside his crotch to fill in the front.

His knees are a little high on his legs, though.  It results in some awkward posing.  It’s somewhat understandable, given he’s got treads in his shins, but still it’s a thing.

It’s kind of amazing how distinct you can make the vehicle modes of a Triple Changer when given all this extra mass to work with.  There’s even a surplus of pegs and tabs to keep everything where it needs to be in every mode.  He’s… comprehensive.  Other than those friggin’ shoulders, this guy’s pretty amazing.

I mean, he’s no Springer, but who is, really.

The Dumbing of Age Book 2 Kickstarter funded in like 20 hours, the second stretch goal (Saturday updates) took another day, and jeezus crap I didn’t expect us to be nearing on the first Roomies! Book 2 stretch goal before the weekend began in earnest!  You guys never cease to exceed my expectations.  But, yeah.  If we reach $27k, we get the long-long-long-long-awaited Roomies! Book 2 with black and white interiors.  And since there are a handful of color Sundays in that book, if we reach $32k, we can afford to print the book in color to accommodate them!  So if you need a book in your life about college that’s really kind of about fighting aliens for the government, I’d take a gander yonder.

(Why Roomies! Book 2 instead of SP! Book 5?  ’Cuz folks have been waiting waaaaaaay longer for the former — like ten years — and I need to get this done to absolve my conscience.  SP! 5 is next, whenever that opportunity is, though.  At the rate we’re going, hell, that might be another stretch goal this go-round, but I won’t wanna get any hopes up prematurely.)

(And why is it not “Giant-Sized Cerebus Syndrome” any more?  I’ve decided since that even being reminded about Dave Sim makes me feel sad in my heart, and I’m gonna be selling piles of these things one foot in front of me at cons for years, so it had to go.)

HERE IS A LINK ABOUT THE STUDY

also oh hey did you know there’s a kickstarter for dumbing of age book 2

it funded so fast it funded between shortpacked updates