Comic Review: Go-Bots #1

Go-Bots #1

IDW Publishing

Story and Art: Tom Scioli

Tom Scioli’s Go-Bots #1 fills the big, Transformers shaped hole left in the wake of IDW’s line ending Unicron event. Written and illustrated by Tom Scioli, the book reimagines the imitation robots-in-disguise, who Hasbro eventually ended up with the rights to. Go-Bots #1 quickly establishes itself outside of Transformers’ shadow with a robot revolution plotline. There’s nothing alien about these human-created machines. Scioli employs his approach from his previous IDW books, a combination of a surprisingly serious but nonetheless ironic presentation of the original content. Unfortunately, it might not be enough to save the Go-Bots from obscurity.

Scioli’s art is the strength of Go-Bots #1. It captures the best aspects of the Kirby generation, without feeling regressive or indulgent. Besides accurately capturing the feeling of that era, he manages to work its constraints into its style. The rigidity gives it a weight and clarity sorely lacking in modern comic book art. While it’s far from being as meticulous as its contemporaries, that lends it a certain warmth. Scioli’s use of perspective and composition is also very unique. He employs a large number of panels without it feeling redundant or overwhelming. Scioli maintains the original aesthetic of the Go-Bots, while still offering something impressive to look at.

Unfortunately, Scioli doesn’t have a lot to work with when it comes to characters and narrative. His previous licensed work involved characters like Optimus Prime and Snake Eyes. Besides being iconic, they have a lot of narrative potential and some real depth if handled correctly. But the likes of Leader 1 and Cy-Kill aren’t just obscure. They’re so derivative it’s difficult to do anything with them without straying too far from what they are. And Go-Bots #1 clearly has a lot of respect for the source material, so there’s an understandable fear of straying too far from it. Additionally, the humans exist entirely as foils for their creations as too much emphasis on them would undermine the premise. Go-Bots #1 is unfortunately hampered by its own artistic integrity, though you have to respect that dedication.

Go-Bots #1 puts more emphasis on the idea of a society with commercially available, sentient, vehicular robots than anything else. The “good” go-bots loyally follow their human owners, while the “bad” go-bots see them as a burden to be cast aside. The rest of the book might be flat but Scioli’s archaic but otherwise straight faced vision of a robot revolution is interesting. Go-Bots #1 is a victim of its own property but Scioli’s unique perspective might just be enough to save the book. At the very least, it leaves enough to make issue #2 worth reading.