Last Stand of the Wreckers issue 3

	; "Keep shooting! The fans have money on which of us buys it first!"
Publisher	IDW Publishing
First published	March 24, 2010
Cover date	March 2010
Writers	Nick Roche and James Roberts
Pencils	Nick Roche and Guido Guidi
Inks	Guido Guidi, John Wycough and Andrew Griffith
Colors	Josh Burcham and Joana Lafuente
Letters	Neil Uyetake
Editor	Andy Schmidt
Associate editor	Denton J. Tipton
Continuity	2005 IDW continuity
Chronology	Current era (2010)

"Let's split up, gang." "Great idea, that couldn't possibly go wrong."

Synopsis

Two years ago, in Garrus-9's maximum security penitentiary, Overlord restores Shockwave to a fully functional state. Shockwave comments that it has been almost a year since Overlord took over Garrus-9, yet he only revives Shockwave now. Overlord fakes guilt, but quickly moves onto business; he offers Shockwave his freedom in exchange for removing the Achilles virus Megatron had Shockwave implant in Overlord years ago, which created a "blind spot" in Overlord’s superior tactical reasoning whenever he applied it against Megatron. As Overlord's goals further his own, Shockwave agrees. Shockwave observes Overlord's sadistic treatment of his "guests" is in fact simply intended to draw Megatron to him. After all, "You're not the first phase-sixer to bait Megatron." Overlord simply responds that he only needs to be the last.

HEADS A'SPLODE!!!

Springer, Impactor, Kup, Twin Twist and Guzzle run from a massive contingent of Decepticons, cut off from the other team which landed in the Pit, right into Overlord's lap. Unable to worry about them now, they turn and open fire on their pursuers; Impactor declares it payback for Fortress Maximus and the others. Twin Twist confirms (from his connection with Topspin) that the others are alive... well, Topspin is...

Meanwhile, Topspin and the rest of his team (Perceptor, Ironfist, Rotorstorm, Pyro and Verity Carlo) find themselves facing Overlord, who had hoped for a team of Decepticons sent by Megatron, and is unimpressed by the Wreckers. Rotorstorm counters by yelling, "Wreckers combine!" before commenting that he thinks it's funny. Overlord suddenly laughs, and a nervous Rotorstorm joins in. Overlord then calmly places a gun to Rotorstorm's head and shoots him between the optics, splashing the others in mech fluid.

Guzzle is ecstatic that Ironfist's ammo, which targets brain modules, is causing the Decepticons' heads to explode. He transforms and brings down the roof to buy some time. Springer orders Kup and Guzzle to find the "help" they had discussed earlier, while the rest continue with the mission to find the prisoners. Impactor reveals the prisoners are in Cell Block 6, directly beneath them. Disregarding his wounds, Twin Twist transforms and drills down. He indeed suffers a wave of pain...

...as does Topspin in the Pit. Overlord offers the option of surrender. Perceptor merely orders Pyro to protect Verity as the rest attack.

Twin Twist drills through the floor and finds himself falling through thin air. Impactor and Springer follow; Springer transforms and catches the others. They are attacked by Treadshot, who is taken out by Impactor. Landing, they find the destroyed body of Kick-Off. Impactor reveals that he was a Pit champion with eleven kills. After his twelfth, Overlord would have given him a choice. Impactor doesn't know what it was, but clearly Kick-Off made the wrong one. Twin Twist discovers that they triggered a defense mechanism. Before they can react, a field deactivates them all.

Overlord is calmly trouncing the Wreckers when Stalker notifies him of the other team. Amused, Overlord announcing the Wreckers' presence over the comm and promises freedom to any Decepticon who brings him a head. The eager Decepticons then throw themselves after Perceptor's team. He buys them some time by exploding a fuel tank, and the team escapes.

Finally having some breathing space, Ironfist suffers a panic attack, revealing he never expected this kind of visceral experience: "that was not part of the deal". Topspin snaps, yelling at Ironfist that they had a vote for the others but had no say in his presence, and that people die in stupid ways. Ironfist loses his temper, telling him not to dare talk to him about death, but Perceptor calms them down, reminding them things can't afford to get personal.

Climbing down to the maximum security cells, Kup tells Guzzle to watch his step, since dying on a rescue attempt is pointless. Guzzle recalls some friends who died saving another Autobot. Kup asks if it was worth it, and Guzzle merely responds it depends on who you ask.

As they make their way through the Southern Wing, Topspin explains to Pyro his branched spark with Twin Twist, a rare condition which causes them to sometimes feel each other's pain, and that they don't think about what happens if one dies. Pyro realises Verity is still locked in his chest and frees her. Verity snaps at him, bringing up Rotorstorm, and immediately regrets it. Examining the locked chamber that holds their objective, Aequitas, Perceptor finds the torn, comatose body of Fortress Maximus wired to it, turned into a living lock pic by Overlord, attempting billions of codes in an attempt to open the chamber. Fortunately, Perceptor knows the access code, and the Wreckers enter the chamber, standing before Aequitas.

Elsewhere, Twin Twist watches through Topspin's eyes before Stalker snaps him back to reality. While pinned to a table in the Spark Extraction Chamber with his mouth forced open, Stalker leans in with a scalpel, and Twin Twist begins screaming.

Featured characters

(Characters in italic text appear only in flashbacks.)
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Autobots

Decepticons

Humans

Guzzle (3)
Kup (4)
Impactor (5)
Twin Twist (6)
Springer (7)
Pyro (8)

Shockwave (1)
Overlord (2)
Stalker (14)
Snare (15)
Treadshot (16)

Verity Carlo (13)

Quotes

"You think you're enjoying this, but you're not. ... The open graves. The torture chambers. All just hollow theatrics. This is an exercise in provocation. This is you trying to get Megatron's attention."

—Shockwave on Overlord's "grand scheme"

"Bold words, Overlord. But you reckoned without one thing... Wreckers: combine!" (beat) "Well, I thought it was funny."

—Rotorstorm. No more explanation is required.

"He shot him in the head, Perceptor! In the head! This isn't what being a Wrecker's about... saving lives, yes. Dramatic rescues, yes. And having adventures! What's wrong with just having adventures?"

—Ironfist's fanboy illusions are crushed and mutilated.

"Nice knowing you, everyone. Even you, Verity. Kind of."

—Topspin

Notes

Continuity notes

Read #4 and #5, then re-read the scene with Ironfist's breakdown and find a whole new meaning...
Guzzle's friends died saving a demented Kup from Tsiehshi. Kup has no memory of these occurrences, and the morality and necessity of those sacrifices would continue to be questioned into the other Wreckers miniseries.

Real-life references

Overlord paraphrases the Master of Doctor Who fame when he requests that the Decepticons "please attend carefully", a famous line of the Master's from the original Who serial "Logopolis", notable enough to be used again in the revived series episode "The Sound of Drums". James Roberts has previously said that in his head, Overlord sounds like John Simm, the actor who had most recently played the Master at the time.^[1]

Errors

After dropping the character profile from issue #2, two profiles were promised for this issue to make up for it. No profiles were published in this issue. Instead, you get all those ads listed below.
In all illustrations Rotorstorm's guns are coloured wrong placing pink at the front rather than the back.
Topspin is missing his chest insignia throughout the whole issue.

Other trivia

While Nick Roche's pages continue his trend of using hand-drawn faction sigils, Guido Guidi's pages use Photoshop-applied faction sigil templates. No contest which technique ends up looking better.
In the Swedish hardcover edition of this story, Rotorstorm specifically names the joke combiner as Ruination.

Production

The hardcover trade of Last Stand reveals information about both Roche's original pitch and early Roche-Roberts scripts.

In Roche's pitch:

This was narrated by Snare, presented as the information he'd given to Impactor earlier.
Overlord searches a pile of corpses and finds a crown-looking ruined cannon, setting up an appearance by Grimlock next issue.
At the end it's revealed that Stalker has discovered Snare's treachery and was the one going through his records. He kills Snare rather than hand him to Overlord because being a comms officer was boring.

In early scripts:

Rotorstorm has a more heroic death, telling the others to run while he covers them. He dies in the same way Pyro will in #5.
Originally this issue contained a scene of Perceptor's team escaping from a Predator jet in vehicle mode. Ironfist (while riding on top of Pyro and trying not to pass out) would have saved the group by shooting the Decepticon down, using a gun he build out of the scrap he found in the Pit . This was dropped due to space constraints and that it would be better for the story if Ironfist finally 'comes good' in the final issue.

Covers (3)

Cover A: Pyro, Rotorstorm, Ironfist, and Verity fire their weapons, art by Nick Roche and colors by Josh Burcham.
Cover B: Twin Twist falls through the air with Springer jetting to catch him, and Shockwave's eye in the background, art and colors by Trevor Hutchison.
Cover RI: "Virgin" title-free edition of cover B.