Text
One of my favorite parts of phase 2 (and indeed one of the few moments I resonated with IDW Prowl) was when the neutrals were coming back to Cybertron and Prowl said that he refused to let Autobots be pushed aside and overruled after they were the ones who fought for freedom for 4 million years (the exact wording escapes me atm).
And I mean, that resentment still holds true even once the colonists come on bc like. As much as it's true that Cybertron's culture is fucked up, and as funny as it can be to paint Cybertronians as a bunch of weirdos who consider trying to kill someone as a common greeting not important enough to hold a grudge over.... The colonists POV kind of pissed me off a lot of times, as did the narrative tone/implications that Cybertronians are forever warlike and doomed to die by their own hands bc it just strikes me as an extremely judgemental and unsympathetic way to deal with a huge group of people with massive war PTSD and political/social tensions that were rampant even before the war?
Like, imagine living in a society rife with bigotry and discrimination where you get locked into certain occupations and social strata based on how you were born. The political tension is so bad there's a string of assassinations of politicians and leaders. The whole planet erupts into an outright war that leads (even unintentionally) to famine and chemical/biological warfare that destroys your planet. Both sides of the war are so entrenched in their pre-war sides and resentment for each other that this war lasts 4 million years and you don't even have a home planet any more. Then your home planet gets restored and a bunch of sheltered fucks come home and go "ewww why are you so violent?? You're a bunch of freaks just go live in the wilderness so that our home can belong to The Pure People Who Weren't Stupid And Evil Enough To Be Trapped In War" and then a bunch of colonists from places that know nothing about your history go "lol you people are so weird?? 🤣🤣 I don't get why y'all are fighting can't you just like, stop??? Oh okay you people are just fucked up and evil and stupid then" ((their planets are based on colonialism where their Primes wiped out the native populations btw whereas the Autobots and OP in particular fought to save organics. But that never gets brought up as a point in their favor)) as if the damage of a lifetime of war and a society that was broken even before the war can just magically go away now that the war is over.
Prowl fucking sucks but he was basically the only person that pointed out the injustice of that.
And then from then on out most of the characters from other colonies like Caminus and wherever else are going "i fucking hate you and your conflicts" w/ people like literal-nobody Slide and various Camiens getting to just sit there lecturing Optimus about how Cybertronians are too violent for their own good and how their conflicts are stupid, with only brief sympathetic moments where the Cybertronians get to be recognized as their own ppl who deserve sympathy before going right back to being lambasted.
Like I literally struggled to enjoy the story at multiple points because there was only so much I could take of the characters I knew and loved being raked over coals constantly while barely getting to defend themselves or be defended by the narrative so like. It was just fucking depressing and a little infuriating to read exRID/OP
#squiggposting#and like dont get me wrong barber wasnt trying to make cybertronians the bad guys or whatever#it's just a problem with his writing where like. he has A Message he wants to send#and so he uses the entire story literally just for The Message even if it involves bullshit plotlines#or familiar characters ppl were reading about for the past decade being shit on by OCs made up to fill a new roster#like barber's writing tends to lean way too much on a sort of lecturing tone#without giving proper care towards including moments where characters get to like. fucking express themselves and share their side#sort of like how barber couldnt be bothered to write pyra magna and optimus actually talking to each other during exrid#and instead during OP ongoing pyra is suddenly screaming about how OP is unteachable#even tho she never even tried to teach him bc she and OP never interacted bc i guess barber couldnt be bothered#he just needed someone to lecture OP so fuck making the story make sense or like letting OP get to say anything in defense#this is the infuriating part of barber's writing bc i think he has incredible IDEAS and was in charge of the lore i was most interested in#but most of the time his execution sucks and he's basically just mid with a few brilliant moments occasionally#or like he has a message about the cycle of violence he wants to convey#but his narrative choices trying to convey that theme made his story come off as super unsympathetic to the ppl who suffered#to the point where barber actively kneecapped some scenes that couldve been super fucking intense and emotional#in favor of the characters lecturing each other or some stupid plot to criticize OP#that time in unicron where windblade screamed about how this is their fault and then arcee replied that her planet is build on coloniation#shouldve happened more often than literally the last series of the ocntinuity. like goddamn stfu about your moral superiority#when your own sins are right fhere lol
219 notes
·
View notes
Last Seen Blogs
